The First, The Best, The Last
by Cody MacArthur Fett
Summary: The year is 2015, Earth is besieged both from within and without by enemies new and old, and only the people of the SGC and Nerv can defend it, but will these two organizations fight with or against each other? Current chapter: On All Fronts
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: I do not own the Stargate franchise, that is owned by MGM, which is owned by Sony. Nor do I own the Evangelion property, that belongs to Gainax.

* * *

**Ori Archaeological Expedition**

**Unknown Planet**

**July 14****th****, 2015**

To say that Janus Lacasa was bored would be an understatement. It was bad enough that he had somehow pissed off someone higher up the chain of command to get this job that essentially amounted to ferrying around a bunch of academics from planet-to-planet across the Milky Way in an old mothership retired after the Second Ori Crusade because of cost overruns from reparations to the Milky Way. It was, all in all, a recipe in political posturing and mind-numbing lectures on the _long_ history of the Quad-Galaxy Area: the archaeologists had discovered some documents back in their home galaxy that eluded to the ancient Ori launching a series of weapons after the Alterans and into the Milky Way, and since nobody wanted unexploded ordinance laying around unattended Janus had been ordered to go and collect all the weapons before they could be set off. So far the weapons had been non-existent and the mission had been a dud, even if the space monkeys (as the Tau'ri called archaeologists) did find enough Alteran ruins to cover a small continent.

Today was just one more dig like all the rest: they'd gone to the coordinates of some backwater planet that didn't even have a stargate, found some ruins, and started scanning for anything unusual while using a plethora of digging instruments (including some modified Earth-built Caterpillar excavators bought from an intermediary) to dig up anything "unusual" – which usually was just simple tablets or murals that the space monkeys found interesting. In a few hours the fighters fitted with the ground penetrating sensors would finish up their sweep, find nothing, and then he'd yank the space monkeys away from their dig so that they could continue on their merry way . . . _"Milord, we've found something. You're going to want to see this too, it's . . . big."_

_Or not_, Janus thought to himself quickly before grabbing his comm and walking over to the transporter ring platform. "Yeah, yeah, I'm on my way, Mora. And for the love of . . . goodness, please don't call me 'milord'," Janus replied back, still stumbling over the proper religious terms to use after all these years.

"_I understand . . . sir,"_ the man at the other end of the line said before shutting off the connection.

_Ugh, I'm getting too old for this_, Janus thought to himself before ordering one of his subordinates to activate the rings.

* * *

They had come, after countless thousands of years they had finally come. Truly, this was a joyous day for all of them. And yet protocol must still be adhered to, Ariel would confirm that their visitors' intentions were pure.

* * *

"So, what have we got here, gentlemen?" Janus asked the moment he reached the hastily set up archaeological camp next to an area where practically all of the expedition's excavators were rapidly assembled and starting to dig something out of the ground.

"It's the big one, mi... sir," Mora responded. "It's an artificial structure, near perfect circle, slightly tapered at the bottom, 13.5 kilometers in diameter at its widest point."

"That _is_ big," Janus deadpanned.

"There's more, sir," Mora continued. "Not only is this thing sitting on ground zero of a massive crater, but it's hollow, and we started detecting unknown energy signatures inside it about five minutes after we detected it."

Janus took a moment to absorb that. They really weren't operating under false intel, there really was a gigantic weapons system produced by the ancient Ori sitting right under their . . . No, that was just jumping the gun, they still had no idea whether it was Ori or not, or even a weapons system for that matter. "Step up the excavation. If this thing really is coming back on line, and if it is a weapons system, we need to disarm it as fast as possible. Move all non essential personnel back to the staging area on the other side of the mountain range as well, if this thing blows I want to save as many people as we can."

So the orders where carried out, and the digging commenced in earnest. Hours passed, darkness came, lights were lit, and they pressed onwards. Thousands of tons of dirt of was removed, thousands more tons of rock were blasted away, until they finally reached the outer wall of the huge structure two days later. As yet more rock and dirt was removed to make way for the drilling equipment – in reality a re-purposed beam weapon from one of the many motherships scrapped after the war – several archaeologists made their way to the edge of the wall and began searching for any way into the structure that didn't involve blasting a hole in it with a giant anti-ship weapon. Needless to say, it wasn't going as well as the diggers would have liked.

"Tell me you got something, Mora. Please tell me you got something," Janus implored as he skidded his way onto the bottom of the truly massive pit they had dug in the ground.

"Well, I've got good news and bad news," Mora began, checking his clipboard as he did so. "The good news is that we've found a way into the structure. The bad news is that it was fused up by energy weapon fire, and of course, by the several thousand degree high-friction plummet into the atmosphere quickly fallowed by the massive kinetic-energy blast caused by aforementioned plummet.

"Thank you, Mora," Janus replied, rubbing the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Is there any other double-edged sword you'd like to throw at me today?"

"Just one, sir," Mora began again. "We were able to find one surviving insignia on structure, and . . ."

"And?"

". . . And it's Ori," Mora finished.

"Wonderful," Janus sighed, that settled it, it was either a heavily armored warship or a weapons platform of some kind, there just were no other reasons for the Ori to have been in the Milky Way at the same time as the Alterans. "Well, there's no point in fighting any longer. Get the cannon ready to fire, we'll bust this thing open within the hour."

Twenty minutes later, everyone had cleared the pit and they were ready to do just that, all they needed was Janus' command and they would begin "drilling." For his part Janus was only slightly annoyed at this turn of events, on the one hand it showed that the space monkeys weren't completely wrong and there was still an once of credibility and competence left in his once great nation, while on the other it meant he'd have to stay away from home for that much longer while they went around disarming the things. Still, no sense prolonging the inevitable, whatever was in that thing would just be getting more powerful the longer they delayed.

"Fire it up!" Janus called out to the cannon operator. "Cut a hole, 100 meters by 100 meters!"

The cannon fired, it was a terrible weapon of war turned to a slightly more peaceful purpose and it seemed to protest that change in status every step of the way. As the terrible screeching sound filled the air everyone covered their ears and grit their teeth, trying desperately to block out the unholy screeching. Everyone, that is, save for the operator of the cannon, who for some inexplainable reason was laughing manically at the top of his lungs and was somehow still able to be heard by a large number of people.

The unbearable screeching went on for a good fourteen and a half minutes before an entrance was finally cut, a near-perfect square that promptly collapsed in on the structure as soon as the cutting was done . . . and they shot at it with two dozen extra-large bore recoilless rifles. "Yush, Hanna, take your squads up and explore the area. Stay alert and keep in constant comm contact, we don't want to be unawares by whatever unsavory booby-traps the crew may have left in there," Janus yelled out at the assembled troops. "Everyone else, grab a weapon and get ready to either open fire or make a fighting retreat. Now!"

Everyone moved to carry out the commander's orders, moving with a speed and efficiency that conveyed their years of training and experience as warriors, as well as the years of peace since the last war. They started to cluster around the newly made hole, two squads of five equipped with rappelling equipment and armed with Crusade-era staves and wrist-mounted pulse weapons, an old but still very reliable force that take on any force allied against it – or at least stay alive long enough to report being slaughtered by some unfathomable cosmic horror. The hole itself looked just like that, a big square pit of utter blackness that was just barely illuminated by the sun overhead – it was either far bigger on the inside then it was on the outside or the area around the hole had been specifically engineered to create the optical illusion of infinite blackness, neither of those possibilities really appealed to the intergalactic spelunkers.

Suddenly, a bright beam of light lanced out of the hole and struck the lead soldier. Immediately everyone jumped and pointed their weapons into the inky blackness of the abyss, even as the light covering the soldier began to die down to the point where they could see the solder being hit with it. "Hey, everybody!" the soldier called out. "I think it's all right. It feels like this is just their way of communicat . . . Ugh, no. GET OUT OF MY HEAD!"

Janus could sense everyone assembled collectively hold back the almost inevitable cascade of vomit as the soldier's tortured screams echoed through the pit, only to be silenced a few seconds later by a horrendous gurgling noise that sounded the soldier's death by massive brain hemorrhage. "Staves only! Open fire!" Janus called out at the top of his lungs. As soon as the words had left his mouth the gapping maw of the structure was simply flooded with cyan-colored lances of energy, all stabbing through the dark, desperately looking for a target yet hitting nothing.

A full 10.735 seconds after the firing started a ghastly sound halfway between fabric tearing and a thunderclap split the air, and a being that should not have existed came into the fray on top of the structure. It was over 80 meters tall, stood atop four spindly legs that laughed in the face of every law of physics they could in their support of the monstrosity they were connected to, said monstrosity was a boat like hemisphere that was covered with eyes that seemed to reach into the deepest depths of the soul and pull out the deepest fears of all those who gazed upon them. The assembled warriors barked their response as soon as they could, sending all their firepower at the abomination in the hopes that it would die.

As luck would have it, it would not, and it sent forth its reply to those attempting to harm it posthaste. A neon green stream of rapidly evaporating liquid that shouted to the human psyche sickness and death, and dissolved all it touched. The men being attacked barely had time to register what was happening before a full twenty-five percent of their forces with simply gone, their final death wails before their vocal cords fell apart being forever burned into their remaining comrades' minds. Seeing the enormous destruction wrought Janus did the only thing he could, he ordered everyone to retreat back to the ship. Many escaped through the industrial-sized transporter rings, which somehow managed to get all their passengers safely to the staging area despite being used at a far more rapid pace then they were designed for. That evacuation stopped soon afterwards though when the ring platforms were destroyed by an energy beam fired by yet another unspeakable horror, this one looking much like a giant flying scorpion that had been fused with an anti-aircraft gun and a pair of bolt cutters in a way that broke the minds of the remaining soldiers.

Janus was there to witness it. He had failed to get to the rings before they had been destroyed, and now stood at the center of the storm as the monsters from a dozen Tau'ri monster movies swarmed about. However, the demons did not seem content to merely kill the meager remains of the archaeological team, opting instead to let the one who had first drawn blood against them to have its way with them. And so, a massive bird with skin like the central core of the old Ori mothership the expedition had used to get to the planet rocketed high up into the sky through the hole they had drilled in the structure before spreading its wings, leveling out, and coming back around to make a pass at them.

Janus could only stare dumbstruck at the gigantic half-snowflake shaped weapon of a war long since over. He was dimly aware of the remains of his forces blindly firing at any one of the monsters they could get in their sights, he was dimly aware of the spotlight-like beam hitting him and his men, but at that moment all he could think of was that one moment when the "bird of light" had reached the apex of its climb and he had looked around at the various giant monsters only to find them to be completely and utterly ridiculous, hardly worthy of fear, all before the bird had swooped back down and the fear returned – though not as intense as it once was. At least, that was what he thought about until a Molotov cocktail went off inside his head, and his mind was assaulted by thousands of images.

He saw his mother crying, why was she crying? Oh . . . it was because his father was dead. At least he thought it was his father, he didn't recognize the man. Then why did he think of him as his father? Wasn't he a father? No, he never had kids. Who's that? The Prior that came to his village when he was young? He grabbed a young boy and executed him for heresy. What was his crime again, exactly? A fine _example_ of why one shouldn't horde demonic artifacts, that's what the Prior said. The demons, who were they? They called them the Alterans, they were the ones who made the stargates in the Milky Way, who seeded life across said galaxy, and who fought a war with both the Ori and Wraith, whoever they were. Hundreds of images flashed all around him, of horrific blue-skinned humanoids sucking the life out of people, of large spheres like the one they had dug up crashing into planets and disembarking their cargo of monsters, of Ori and Alteran ships clashing above several unknown worlds whose names were lost to time, of thousands of people dying of sickness and disease. The images were all out of order, like they were being taken from several sources all at once with no regard to chronology, it was very confusing and . . . was that Yush sitting on a metal folding chair in the middle of the Plains of Celestis while holding a severed arm and screaming? Why was everyone congratulating him? Ugh, there was too much confusion in this place, and it didn't look like he'd be getting any relief soon. He needed order, he needed some kind of enlightenment, he needed . . . Origin. No, Origin was a lie. But, but why did he believe that? Had he not been a loyal soldier of the Ori for many years? In fact, he still was, right up until . . . until the moment the Tau'ri had opened the Ark of Truth, it was then that he had realized that Origin was a lie, and that even if it wasn't it didn't matter because the Ori were killed when the Tau'ri activated the Sangraal in their home galaxy. Actually, come to think of it, the Tau'ri were responsible for a lot of things: the people in a lot of the galaxy's villages had said that the Tau'ri had defeated the Gou'ld and freed the galaxy, the Tau'ri had defeated the Replicators, the Tau'ri defeated the Ori, the Tau'ri were allies of the Alterans' allies, the Tau'ri had been named the Alterans' successors, the Tau'ri had blown up a sun! Humans from Earth. Stargate Command. The Tau'ri! The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. The Tau'ri. . . .

Back in the real world the beam continued to shine down on Janus and the others, even as blood streamed out of every orifice their heads had. They died soon after.

* * *

"Captain, start the engines, charge the main gun, and bring up the shields – we're getting out of here," Mora barked out as soon as he got onto the bridge of the old mothership back at the rapidly packing up staging area.

"Why the rush, Mora?" the old Prior who had control of the vessel asked in his oft-used kindly tone of voice. "What has happened? Is Janus around?"

"I don't know, Ashter. We lost contact with each other during the evacuation," Mora said hurriedly, even as the various systems around the ship began to power up.

"Am I to assume that something went wrong?"

"The structure turned out to be inhabited by giant monsters."

"Oh dear," Ashter responded softly. "Am I also to be assuming that such creatures were made by the ancient Ori?"

"You are," Mora replied before checking the security camera footage of the staging area. "OK, it looks like everyone is aboard, once the . . ." Mora was interrupted by a bright flash from several kilometers out in front of the ship, which soon left a 190' tall silver humanoid with a bolling ball-shaped face in its wake. "Ashter!"

"I've got it," Ashter called out before slamming his staff into the floor dramatically and causing the ship to rise up into the sky – he had always wondered why that particular feature had been installed, it seemed rather unnecessary given the neural interface.

"Shoot it!" Mora screamed, pointing at the large humanoid.

"Relax, Mora. I am firing," the chalk-white helmsman replied in a rather jovial tone a split second before a large beam shot out of the bow and hit the humanoid dead-on, to no effect. However, Ashter was well aware that it often took more then one superweapon strike to bring down an enemy's shield and quickly followed his initial blast with two more. Then four. Then seven. Then thirteen. Then nineteen. Then twenty-two, and still no effect. "Hmm," Ashter mused aloud. "It appears that we do not have the firepower to engage this enemy. Might I suggest a strategic retreat so that me may return with reinforcements?"

"Do it," Mora responded quickly, just before the ship shuddered due to a disruption in the shields. The young second in command then took a look at several of the external security cameras to confirm his fears, white fungus-like organism was growing on the hull. "And do it quickly, it looks like one of those freaks has teleported under our shields and latched on!"

"I'll lower the shields and ascend then. I doubt it'll be able to survive in the vacuum of space for long."

With those words the massive ship rocketed into space, quickly shedding the warming atmosphere for the relatively extreme temperatures of the insulating vacuum of space. It should have dislodged the foul creature clinging to the ship's back, but it did not. That wasn't to say that there wasn't something dying in orbit around that world that day though, for soon after they had cleared the atmosphere many of the ship's systems began going haywire, and soon after that _all_ of the ship's doors were locked open. The results were as expected.

* * *

The leader of the sentient weapons systems turned its bird-like mask upwards towards the now descending ship. This was bad. Not only had they failed to destroy their mortal enemies, not once, not twice, but three times, but their descendants had also managed to completely destroy faith in Origin and even the gods themselves using their ancestors accursed inventions. Well, they may not have been able to destroy the Alterans and return to their galaxy conquering heroes, but they could certainly reek their vengeance upon these Tau'ri for all the grave injustices they committed. It would take several weeks to make their new ship ready to transport them to Earth, but it would be ready, and then the Tau'ri would die. After that though . . . well, there were three entire galaxies to explore, and the Tau'ri had many outposts. They would be busy for a _long_ time.

* * *

Author's Note: Ho-boy, it's been how long since I uploaded a story here? Must be going on three years, easy. Well, as you can see, the fanfic writing bug has finally bitten me again, only this time it's not _Kim Possible_. Can you guess what is? . . . That's right, it's _Evangelion_. (That was easy though, it's in the description for Pete's sake.) Why _Evangelion_? Well that's rather interesting, for you see I originally got really interested in the fandom after reading Gregg Landsman's excellent fanfic _NGE: Nobody Dies_ after it was recommended to me by someone on Spacebattles' creative writing forum, and was cemented by reading the absolutely suburb (and slightly KP-ish) fan-novel _The Second Try_ by Jimmy Wolk. Both of which can be found on TV Tropes and this website, and both of which come highly recommended by myself. However, as for the series itself and why I like it . . . I honestly couldn't tell you. Logically speaking there's absolutely no reason for me to like the series, especially since I've seen very little it outside of _Rebuild of Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone_. (Which I own, by the way.) Perhaps it's because I see way too much of myself in Shinji, and Rei . . . and Asuka, but whatever it is the fact remains that I love the franchise, and as such I decided to cross it over with my favorite science fiction franchise: _Stargate_!

Anywho, be sure to leave a review or comment below, and stay tuned for chapter 2! There'll be lampshade hanging. ;)


	2. The Anvil

**Disclaimer**: I do not own the Stargate franchise, nor the Evangelion franchise, nor do I claim to. The Stargate franchise is owned by MGM, the Evangelion franchise is owned by Gainax Studios, the original characters and concepts in this story are obviously owned by myself, the US President that appears in this tale... well, he's owned by a completely different company all together, but you won't be finding out which one until the next chapter.

**Author's Notes**: There's a glossary of terms now on my profile page for this story, feel free to look at it at any time. Also, I finally figured out why I like Eva so much, because there isn't a single character on the cast list outside of Seele that I don't want to see achieve their goals or get a great big old hug – heck, I even want to see Gendo reunited with Yui, if only so she can slap some sense into him.

* * *

_Act I: Opening Moves_

_Part I: The Anvil_

**

* * *

Cheyenne Mountain Complex**

**Colorado, United States of America**

**August 3rd, 2015**

**0754 hours Mountain Standard Time**

The day started out like any other at the US Air Force base situated in Cheyenne Mountain. In fact, as one might soon notice after spending any amount of time working there, despite everything that went on in the world the entrance to the massive underground complex always seemed remain the same and never seemed to change – not even any rust or changing of the guard, by the looks of things. It was a comforting thought, and one that calmed Colonel Cameron Mitchell's mind as he drove his car into the complex and along the long, winding, blast reducing, corridors.

On the inside though, Cheyenne Mountain had gone through many, many, upgrades, mostly this was in regards to the complex's size. The massive facility now extended well over three miles into the ground, skirting the boundaries of what was financially feasible for the still sovereign United States of America in the process. The biggest additions to the complex came in the form of the bio-mech support structures, the single largest of these being the Proving Ground, a gigantic room filled with sturdy metal plates and wide open spaces that provided the perfect . . . well, proving ground, for the resident 138ft giant fighting robot, with more on the way.

Mitchell chuckled at the thought moments before he found a parking space. To think, just ten years ago the very thought of using giant fighting robots, and cyborg ones at that, in combat sounded utterly ridiculous to him . . . Actually, come to think of it, it still did. Why were they using the GFRs again? They were a massive target, they couldn't secure buildings as well as infantry, they were beyond overkill against tanks, they cost twice as much as a BC-304C, and to top it all off they had some of the most stupidly designed controls ever. Ah yes, that's why they were using them, because their source in Area 51, the designer of the bio-mechs, had made it clear that the enemies they going to be facing soon were going to be using an "Absolute-Terror Field" – thankfully, usually only called an AT-field – and they needed something to project their own AT-field to cancel out and bring down the enemy's, otherwise their opponent would just cheat and warp reality so that the "bullets" curved around it, and only the bio-mech could produce an AT-field right now.

What really got Mitchell's gears whirling and grinding though was why they even needed to fight their new foes in the first place. They needed to fight them because the Katsuragi Expedition decided to poke the big, glowing, sleeping giant with a large stick and blow up most of Antarctica, causing what simply became known as the Antarctica Blast – in the US at least, every country had their own name for it. Still, whatever name people decided to call it the results were clear: a large portion of the Antarctic ice shelf melting, a gigantic hole in the ground, and earthquakes up and down every major fault line on the planet. Actually, things probably would have been a lot worse had the Ancients not somehow anticipated an event like it and built a ring of shield generators on the continent to contain the blast. That was of little comfort to the people along the fault lines though, especially if they were in California or Chile, both of which were simply devastated by the ensuing earthquakes and aftershocks. The fact that a lot of those earthquakes had caused tsunamis probably didn't help.

"Good morning, Colonel."

"Good morning to you too, Walter," Mitchell answered back to the Chevron Guy as he passed him, his mind still on autopilot.

All told, 2.2 billion people died as a result of the disaster and its aftermath, mostly from disease. They were lucky though, people had focused more on repairing their own countries then striking at their neighbors, with few exceptions. Unfortunately, one of those instances of grand theft resources occurred on the continent of North America between the USA and Mexico, but fortunately said dispute was resolved quickly, albeit violently. But that wasn't the end of it,diplomatically a massive battle between proponents of isolationism and world government raged in the UN: the US and Russia chose isolationism, Europe chose world government, the British Commonwealth chose to make their own alliance, the Middle East and everyone else was split right down the middle. Needless to say, the UN building in New York was now a convention center.

Still, with all that was going on in the world, it really was amazing that the SGC wasn't effected all that much by what was happening outside the mountain. The main "problem" they had with the outside world was their rivalry with their Russian counterparts, it had started with them recovering the Giza stargate at the bottom of the ocean and briefly sending out their own teams to explore the universe, continued with them leasing the gate to the SGC with the condition of a Russian SG team being on staff, escalated when the SGC finally bought back the gate with a combination of ship designs and technology, and snowballed out of control from there to memetic proportions. It was now pretty much a running joke among the people of the Milky Way and Pegasus galaxies that the Russians and Americans were always trying to one-up each other, and always seemed to run into each other at just the wrong moments – heck, there were even rumors going around that the Ruuskies had managed to develop their own GFR, but that would be ridiculous.

"Ah, Colonel Mitchell, right on time," said the voice of Lieutenant General Hank Landry, breaking Mitchell out of his expositionary autopilot as he entered the control room.

"General, just the man I wanted to see. What was going on there?" Mitchell asked, pointing to the deactivating stargate.

"Our trade delegation to Hebridan ran into a bit of a snag while negotiating the newest contract between us and Tech Con Group," the aged General explained.

"Let me guess, the Russians?" Mitchell responded wryly.

"Yep. Landed one of their _Korelev_-class battle cruisers at the local spaceport, waltzed right into the company's headquarters, and started negotiating for enough large-scale transports and upgrade kits to fill Oshkosh. Completely sidelined Lockheed-Martin and their engine contract," Landry answered as he turned and started to walk up the stairs to the briefing room, Mitchell in tow the whole way. "But that's not why you wanted to see me, is it?"

"No, sir, it isn't," Mitchell responded when they reached the top of the stairs.

"You wanted to ask about the whole deal with the GFRs again, didn't you?" Landry inquired knowingly as he passed the table.

"Yes sir, I did, and and if you'll allow it let me first start off by saying once again how much I disapprove of the idea of using children to pilot these things," Mitchell started as they passed through the doorway to Landry's office, Mitchell closing the door soon after.

"No, I won't allow it," Landry responded as he sat down in his chair.

"Sir?" Mitchell queried in a confused tone.

"Believe me, Colonel, I don't like this anymore then you do, probably even less, but we've been over this a million times. The Source's designs are inescapable on this, the bio-mechs must be piloted by a human child," Landry seemed to get pensive for a moment before continuing. "We've tried to give them as normal a life as possible, we've trained them as much as possible so that they'll be prepared, and we've outfitted their war machines with the best technology available so that they'll be ready when the time comes – assuming the documents written by Mayborne and Wier's mutual friend are accurate."

"That's still not good enough, sir," Mitchell countered.

"No, no it isn't, but like I've said before: if the documents turn out to be accurate then the threat will appear within the next two weeks and will exhaust their forces in one year. After that we can just mothball the GFRs and hand the pilots an honorable discharge, end of story," Landry replied before getting a mirthful look on his face. "But we've been over all this before years ago, you're just trying to get one last shot in before fireworks start on the off chance that either I'll listen to you for once, or to provide some exposition in case Dr. Felgar's theory that 'God writes fanfiction' turns out to be true."

"Hit the nail right on the head, sir. However, in defense of Dr. Felgar's theory, the 'Noodle Incident of 2011' really was quite disturbing," Mitchell admitted in the O'Neill-ish tone he used when trying to imitate his predecessor.

"No-one's going to doubt that, but the fact still remains that as distasteful as it is it's all perfectly legal since the executive order allowing people of any age to join the military as bio-mech pilots was signed. However, since you're so interested in the pilots and their mechs, I have a job for you and SG-1," the General said with a hint of mirth.

"Ready and willing, sir," Mitchell responded quickly, the previous conversation temporarily forgotten.

"Glad to hear it. Your mission will be to accompany bio-mech pilot Airman First Class Donald Reeves to the Gamma Site where you and he will stay to oversee the final stages of production for the second GM-206, codename _Baldur_, I'll have specifics for you and the rest of SG-1 at the mission briefing at 1400 hours. Dismissed."

"Sir," Mitchell saluted before leaving the office.

Landry starred at the door where Mitchell had left for several seconds before sighing to himself. He was getting too old for this. Heck, they were _all_ getting too old for this, there was hardly a member of the original SG teams younger then 40, and he himself would be turning 70 that October. Of course the Stargate Program had been in operation for 18 years, which meant that like-it-or-not those same kids the Colonel was looking to get out of the military would be taking over his job soon . . . but not that soon. The senior members of the SGC still had a lot of fight left in them, and it would be a cold day in Hell before they gave up the best damn job in the world just because of a simple thing like aging. Those kids could take _his_ job when they earned it, and that was a long way off.

* * *

Down in the bowels of the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and many hours later one of the oft-talked about children, the pilot of America's sole operational bio-mech, was playing hard to get.

"Leona!" Command Chief Master Sergeant Christopher Ramsey called out into the cavernous hanger. It was big, no doubt about that, half a mile across and over 400' tall, it was designed specifically to house the gigantic forms of the GM-206 Wolverine. Well, house _a_ GM-206, currently _Tyr_ was the only GFR there, but it was still a very impressive sight even if it was mostly submerged up to the upper slope in its armor in Multi-Purpose Artificial Amniotic Fluid (specifically, XL-337). Still, as big as the place was there were only so many places for someone to hide in, especially when there was a skeleton crew of technicians in the massive hanger.

"You looking for Senior Airman Hancock, sir?" one of the technicians asked.

"Yes Staff Sergeant, I am. Have you seen her?" Ramsey responded in a slightly annoyed tone.

"She's in the command pod now, sir. Last I saw she was listening to something on her MP3 player, probably explains why she didn't hear you."

"Thank you, Sergeant."

"You're welcome, sir," the technician said before rounding up the crew to move on to their next job.

_Of course you're in the command pod,_ Ramsey thought to himself before moving amongst the retreating technicians towards said plug. It had always been like this, almost as soon as Leona Hancock had been able to run and definitely as soon as she knew she was going to be a GFR pilot she had spent as much time as she could hanging around _Tyr_. Heck, she had even slept in the command pod on more then a few occasions, much to the bemusement of the bio-mech's AI. All that said, it really came to no surprise that his suspicions and the tech's words were confirmed as soon as Ramsey looked inside the command pod, still in its cradle on the 'water-level' scaffolding and platforms.

"Airman!" Ramsey shouted as soon as he was at the entry plug's hatch, causing the dirty blond-haired girl inside to jump and slightly scatter the papers she was working on. "Airman, is there any particular reason you did not heed my call?"

"Yes, sir," the teenaged Air Force tykebomb answered automatically in a crisp tone. "I was doing my homework in here, while listening to one of General Carter's lectures on applied wormhole physics, and I got too caught up in my own actions and thoughts."

The Sarge nodded slightly at that. "Well, there wasn't too much harm done this time, so I'll let you off with a warning, just don't let it happen again."

"Yes, sir," Hancock snapped, still on auto-pilot.

"Good. Listen, pack up here and get into your NSU, you've got some sims scheduled in half-an-hour, I'll follow you along shortly," Ramsey stated, moving to the side after he had said that to allow Hancock to get up and out. He stood there for several more minutes, watching her go before going to check on some of some of _Tyr_'s systems.

"_You are worried, Sergeant Ramsey,"_ an old baritone stated simply.

"Yeah, Tyr. Yeah I am," Ramsey said softly.

"_About Airman Hancock?"_ the old voice asked.

"Yep," the Sergeant answered honestly.

The giant cyborg suddenly turned its head to look towards the digital tiger pattern camouflage wearing human in front of it. _"We are ready, Sergeant Ramsey. You have taught her well, and have been an exemplary commanding officer. You have nothing to fear . . . Well, except fear itself,"_ it added that last part with a hint of humor.

"I know, Tyr. I know," Ramsey sighed. "But it's still nerve-racking to have to send her and the others out to fight and die because we couldn't think of an alternative solution to the Source's crazy plan."

The massive battlemech seemed to become pensive for a few pregnant seconds before replying. _"I have overheard some people calling you and the commanders of this base monsters for what you do, but by your very words and actions you prove them wrong – you do not enjoy the prospect of sending children into battle one bit. However, if it will give you some solace, there are people in this nation's history who have served in combat, without the protection of several feet of trinium-neutronium-carbon-titanium armor and the best damn AI on Earth, at much younger ages then Leona and they turned out just fine, even winning a few medals in the process."_

"You know, considering just how many medals are awarded posthumously that doesn't exactly inspire confidence in me," Ramsey quipped.

The titan born of a kleptomania-like brand of American industrialism gave a shrug that would have been barely noticeable on a human. _"In this world you take what comfort you can. Besides, the chances of everything aligning in such a way to kill her is astronomical. Nay, it would be far easier to believe that she would get arrested for assaulting a congressman that tried to get her _out_ of the unit."_

Ramsey had to laugh at that. "Oh, there's no doubt about that! She'd probably nail 'em right in the jaw while giving them a philosophy lecture. . . . Speaking of congressmen, it just came down the wire that Senator Vargas of Sonora will be visiting here at 0900 hours on Thursday, so try and put on a good show for him while he's here."

"_I will do so, Sergeant. You're going to be informing Airman Hancock of this as well, I assume? Most likely after her sim run?"_ the cyborg did a bizarre imitation of somebody raising an eyebrow.

"Indeed," Ramsey replied simply, using the SGC's most popular catchphrase.

"_Very well, if that is all, I shall return to the inevitable task of military bureaucracy, and shall await yet more insults being thrown at this fine establishment by its 'superiors'." _

Ramsey just shook his head in bemusement before walking off. "See you later, Tyr."

**

* * *

U.S. Navy P-3C Orion **

**Somewhere above the former Antarctic Ice Shelf**

**August 4th, 2015**

**0223 hours Unknown Standard Time**

"_Found anything yet?"_ the pilot asked over the Orion's in-crew radio frequency.

"_Nothing yet, sir,"_ one of the sensor operators answered honestly.

"_All right then, we're moving on to the next part of the grid,"_ the pilot said before banking the turboprop plane and its heavily upgraded sensors off towards to nearby lake.

"_There's gotta be _something_ out here,"_ the co-pilot muttered, his eyes scanning over the rocky, slimy, and still damn cold surface of Earth's southernmost continent. The effects of the Antarctic Blast were still plainly visible across the surface of the landmass almost anywhere you went on it, and varied from the gigantic crater that took up most of the India-ward side of the continent, to the newly active volcanoes dotting the mountain ranges, to the massive patch of a species of bioluminescent algae that had been exposed to the sun after a million years that the Orion and its crew were flying over at that very moment on their way to the shore. It really was quite ironic, a lot of the scientific community had assumed that there would be nothing left alive on the once-frozen continent after the Blast, human or otherwise, but in reality it turned out there had been an entire ecosystem designed for the Antarctic cold and total lack of sun hiding just beneath the ice cap, and when the immense heat and concussive force of the Blast melted said ice cap . . . well, it was like hooking a nuke reactor up to a sports car. All right, so the life was almost totally alien and _beyond_ freaky at times, but hey, life was life. _"Hyperspace window signatures don't just show up on their own,"_ the co-pilot continued.

"_Sure they do, Oscar. It's called a sensor ghost, or systems' glitch, depending on what flew up your transistor,"_ another one of sensor operators snarked in a helpful tone.

"_Cut the chatter, Johnson!"_ the first operator snipped before something on his caught his eye. _"Whoa! Whoa! I think I got something! Mike, get us out over the water, quickly!"_

"_Rodger that,"_ the pilot acknowledged before accelerating to 400 knots. _"Hey, just so we're not flying blind here, what exactly is it that you picked up?"_

"_It was a trench, big one, looked pretty recent, like something had plowed into the ground to create it within the last couple of hours,"_ the first said excitedly just before he double-checked his readings again. _"Bingo! I was right! One crash trench, 100 meters below the surface of the lake . . . God Almighty, will you look at that? It looks like they tore up the whole lake bottom on their way down."_

"_Any sign of what made it?"_ one of the flight engineers asked curiously.

"_. . . No, I'm not picking up anything on any of the scanners,"_ one of sensor operators responded after a moment. _"They might me using a cloaking device though, the trench curves up at both ends so they obviously had enough power left to pull up, whether or not they're sitting down there though is anybody's guess."_

"_What do you say we pop a few sonobuoys then, and see if we can't rile them up enough to give away their positions?"_ the TACCO asked with a slightly manic grin, the thrill of the hunt finally getting to him after several hours flying around without finding anything.

"_I think that's an _excellent _idea,"_ the pilot replied evenly. _"Hey, Rookie, fire off a couple of those things and let's see if we can get a few pings on them?"_

"_Can do, sir,"_ the enlisted IFT acknowledged.

Outside the Orion made a diagonal sweep of the large lake and fired off a trio of sonobuoys into the water from its underside. As soon as the buoys left the quad-engined plane they deployed their parachutes, and began their slow decent towards the water. When the buoys did finally reach the water with a splash they dropped down several feet before deploying a yellow flotation device, while the contents of the buoy's main body continued to fall, at least until it reached the end of its line. Then the casing began to fall away, leaving an increasingly lengthening hextent of white poles, until eventually it had nothing left to reveal and fell away onto the bottom of the lake. Without the constraint of the casing the poles fell down as well, trailing conductive wires with bright orange balls around them as they did so, until eventually they formed a net-like web of sensors that looked remarkably like the Pentagon in Washington D.C. from above. Of course, none of that could be seen beneath the waves of a hot spring lake in the Antarctic winter.

"_Anything?"_ the pilot asked expectantly.

"_Nothing,"_ the second sensor operator responded. _"Look, we're hitting this place with every kind of sensor I can think of, and we're not getting squat. No cloaking system is that good, so it's very likely that whatever made that trench is long gone by now."_

"_. . . All right then,"_ the pilot said dejectedly, the sent of the prey once again lost in his mind. _"Get the SGC on the line and tell them to look out for possible off-world infiltrators. We'll finish up our original search pattern, and then we'll head back to McMurdo. Agreed?"_

"_Agreed!"_ came back the unanimous reply.

**

* * *

Hancock family home, Peterson Air Force Base**

**Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States of America**

**August 4th, 2015**

**1515 hours Mountain Standard Time**

"I'm home!" a small fourteen year old girl called out as soon as she entered the small mass-produced home in the AFB suburbs, identical to its companions save for the M-60 Patton-shaped lawn gnomes.

"Hello dear, back so soon?" Mrs. Sgt. Hancock asked cheerfully from the kitchen. Normally the young Airman would have gone straight to the Cheyenne Mountain Complex after school and would stay there until 2000 at night, so it was quite the surprise to see her home not long after school ended.

"Yeah, I called into the base to confirm it, and apparently I'm off for the next two weeks baring some emergency," Leona confirmed with a hint of sadness in her voice.

Mrs. Hancock just shook her head at this before going back to prepping the chicken pot pie. Leona had always been a workaholic for as long as they knew each-other, and while it was quite odd in the grand scheme of things for someone who was essentially a child soldier to be so enthusiastic about their job, Leona herself had always been the one to point out, and quote, "I pilot a giant fighting robot. Giant robots negate all angst." Which of course only made people worry about her and her psychological condition even more.

"You know dear, this could actually be a very good opportunity," Mrs. Hancock said chipperly.

"Really, how so?" Leona asked in a voice that somehow mixed in equal amounts of sarcasm, I-don't-care, and genuine curiosity.

"Well, I am on leave for the next two weeks, and now so are you. This could be the perfect time for some mother-daughter bonding time," Mrs. Hancock answered as she enacted her vengeance on a cucumber that had been especially hard to acquire at the market.

"Oh, joy!" Leona exclaimed. _OK, not really, but 'Actually Mom, I'd rather spend my free time tending to paperwork and doing PT then with you' _really _doesn't sound that good._

Mrs. Hancock sighed at her adopted daughter's false happiness. She could take the disappointment, really, but it was just plain insulting that Leona felt the need to lie to her. Whatever misgivings she had though, she didn't voice them. "I was thinking we could go for a three day hike up in the mountains after you get home from school tomorrow, how does that sound?"

"That sounds great, mom," Leona lied.

"Leona . . ." Mrs. Hancock began in a tone that oozed disappointment before being interrupted by the door opening yet again.

"Hey! We're home!" twin voices called out in unison.

"Hello, squirts," Leona stated on autopilot.

"Hey, Big Sis!" the two voices, one male and one female, once again called out in perfect synchronization. "What'cha doin' home so so early?"

Before Leona could answer the male of the pair answered his/her own question. "Oh! I know! Her superiors must have finally smartened up and gotten her out of whatever secret project they got her working on to save face, probably after she punched a senator."

The tykebomb in the room felt her urge to kill her younger brother rising, but before she could act out on her various snarky instincts her sister intervened. "That's crazy, Nathan! Leona doesn't work on any secret projects, she works on deep space radar telemetry . . . or at least she did, but it looks like the higher-ups discovered her grades."

"Nathan, Sarah, that's enough. The reason your sister is home early is that she is on leave for the next two weeks, same as me. Now either you can go finish up the homework that you surely have, or you can stick around while your sister uses her superior strength and skill to beat you to the point of screaming 'uncle'," Mrs. Hancock stated evenly, even as Leona gave her younger siblings a predatory grin.

"Right! See ya later, Leona!" the nine year olds exclaimed in unison before leaving the room.

"You two better have your homework done by the time your father gets home or there'll be hell to pay!" Mrs. Hancock yelled after the twins. "And don't you start going anywhere either, Senior Airman Leona Fairchild Hancock. You're going to stay here and help me prepare this dinner, and then you are going to eat the dinner with the rest of the family. Do I make myself clear?"

The Airman in question opened her mouth to reply . . .

"And don't you dare say you'd rather have some of those MREs that you've been stocking in the fridge! No daughter of mine is going to willingly eat MREs when there's perfectly good normal food available, and I don't give a damn if your taste buds _are_ actually deformed to the point where you like their taste."

. . . And then she promptly closed it, relenting to the superior authoritative powers of her mother. She then silently took up position at her mother's side and began to quietly help her with the meal, at least until she started humming Beethoven's "9th Symphony" to help pass the time in her head.

"No Leona, the curry powder doesn't go in the bread dough."

"Yes, ma'am."

**

* * *

Undisclosed location, somewhere on the American East Coast**

**August 5th, 2015**

**2:03 P.M.**

"Well, this sucks," Prime Minister Shepley Jones of Australia stated bluntly, dropping the folder in his hands as he did so.

"That's one way to put it," President Dimintri Vladikovsky responded. "The loss of Argentina to the United Nations is a great setback considering the country's lithium deposits, but it's not a total loss."

"Yes, except that there's all that land that the free nations of the world have lost yet again," Jones pointed out.

"My point exactly. The UN is too spread out, they're the largest government body in history and there's no way they can regulate all that land," Vladikovsky shot back.

"They don't need to. Hell, they hardly regulate Africa as it is, save for the occasional bombing run," Jones retorted.

As the two supposedly mature world leaders continued to bicker about whether or not Argentina voting to join the UN would help or hurt their cause General Lai Shu of the Republic of China merely rubbed his head in frustration. It wasn't as big a loss as when the UN had absorbed the People's Republic of China, bringing an end to the ten year long war between them and the nation formally known as Taiwan, but it was still one more population group and military that would be joining their much feared enemies, and one more country that would have its resources dedicated to funding the UN's massive war machine. Sure, the countries that had members in the secret alliance known informally as Widerstand had access to intergalactic travel and a plethora of alien technology, but that was little use when their terrestrial enemy had somehow gained teleportation jamming technology and the only weapons they could deploy from space tended to be unsuitable for one reason or another. "Has everyone here has gotten word back from their fleets about large-scale attacks by the Lucian Alliance on strategically vital positions?" he asked suddenly.

At this the two bickering leaders stopped their argument immediately. "Why, yes, as a matter of fact the Combined Commonwealth Starfleet did report such a thing just a few hours ago," the Prime Minister of Australia responded in a polite but slightly surprised tone.

"Our fleet said that there was a good chance they'd be tied in engagements for at least a week," Vladikovsky said, continuing the PM's train of thought. "You must have very good intelligence in our fleets to have discovered such a thing. Am I also to assume this has happened to your fleets as well?"

The General nodded.

Sensing where the conversation was going the only other person at the table that day, the President of the United States, spoke up in his usual aggressive manor. "Now wait just a God-damned second, do you mean to tell me that there's absolutely _no_ ships in _any_ of our fleets able to defend Earth right now?"

Everyone at the table got a look that told the POTUS that he was absolutely right.

"Ah! That's not true!" Jones exclaimed suddenly. "What about the Israelis' and Koreans' ships?"

"Last my people heard the _I.N.S. Judea_ was on its way to set up an outpost on a stargate-less planet and would not be back for some time, and the _R.O.K.S. Sohn Won-yil_ is currently undergoing extensive repairs following operations against pirates near P4X-7182," the General answered, his tone seeming to get graver by the moment.

"Well somebody better get on the line with Jerusalem and tell them to call their ship back, otherwise we're going to have to rely on the Ancient Chair Weapon to defend the planet, and might I remind you that it still hasn't been tested in an actual combat situation since the Wraith rammed into the damn thing all those years ago," POTUS stated in a voice that was practically shouting.

"That's not exactly true," Vladikovsky said cryptically. "But you're right, Mr. President. At the moment almost all of our mobile defenses are currently occupied, and coincidentally all of it is happening within the same week," he paused for dramatic effect. "I smell a rat, but whom?"

"We should dedicate a good portion of our intelligence agencies to finding out who that is. This could just be a coincidence, but it could also be the first rumblings of a true partnership between the UN and the Lucian Alliance, or something else entirely. I suggest we find out just which one it is gentlemen," the sole non-head of state at the meeting that day expounded. "Agreed?"

"Agreed," came back the small choir of responses.

"Now, if that's everything, I suggest we close up for the day," Jones said in a slightly tired tone. A few seconds of silence followed, then Jones disappeared, followed soon after by Lai and Vladikovsky, leaving only POTUS at the now truly empty table.

The President, for his part, merely sat calmly in his seat considering all that had happened up to that point for one final time before all hell broke loose. When he was just a boy growing up on a farm in Idaho he had imagined becoming president to help rid the world of Communism, but then the Union collapsed and Communism had begun to fall apart across the globe, leaving him in a bit of a quandary about what to do in his as yet unrealized political career. Enter the Antarctica Blast and the UN's rise to power; the soon to be president instantly recognized the signs that the super-national body was rapidly heading down the road to that hated red ideology and organized and begun laying the groundwork for a grass-roots movement to oppose the UN, which soon lent itself to a Senate seat, which soon lent itself – if only barely – to a victory in the 2012 presidential election, which soon lent itself to him finding out that not only was there alien life out there in the cosmos – to say nothing of the absolute genius that was the Stargate Program – but that there was in existence a secret cabal of various people from across the globe called Widerstand that was dedicated to not only stopping the massive global hyperpower that dominated the world in its tracks. It was certainly more subversive then he would have liked, but it had also certainly been useful to his goals, and it had allowed him to set the stage for the next – and possibly final – act of humanity's play.

**

* * *

Somewhere in the Colorado Rockies**

**August 6th, 2015**

**11:20 P.M. Mountain Standard Time**

"You still awake, honey?" Mrs. Hancock asked her daughter softy as she walked towards her.

"Yeah, yeah I guess I am," the still very much awake teen soldier answered.

"Any particular reason you're still up then?" Mrs. Hancock inquired with a hint of mirth in her voice, putting her arm around her daughter as she did so.

"I don't know," Leona admitted after several seconds of complete silence. "I've just got feeling going through my bones like something's going happen soon … Heh, you probably think I'm being completely nuts here, don't you?" she asked ironically, twisting her neck towards her mother as she did so and causing her sulfur-colored eyes to catch the moonlight in such a way that it amazingly didn't look totally terrifying.

"No, of course I don't, sweetie," Mrs. Hancock answered honestly. Don't and couldn't. Despite the tension that cropped up between the two Mrs. Hancock genuinely loved her daughter and wanted only the best for her, and despite what some doctors had said she honestly couldn't believe that the little girl in front of her was anything other then perfectly sane. "Lot's of people have had those same kind of feelings all throughout history, and a lot of times those 'gut-instincts' have been right," she continued.

"So, what? Humans have some sort sixth sense about these sort of things?" Leona asked incredulously.

"I suppose you could say that," Mrs. Hancock answered, returning them to the silence that reigned before. "So, are you enjoying yourself yet?"

Leona got one of her snarky looking faces on for a second before answering, as if daring her mother to accept the answer. "Yeah. Yeah, I think I am, but don't…" she was cut off by the ringing of her cell phone, something that she quickly remedied by snatching the offending instrument out of her coat pocket and flipping it open. The caller ID proudly proclaimed that the call was from **BMP Cmnd**, and upon seeing this the young pilot could do little to contain the look of absolute _joy_ that covered her features. "Hancock here," she answered as professionally as possible. ". . . I see. Very well, beam me over in thirty seconds then."

"An emergency I take it?" Mrs. Hancock asked knowingly.

"Yeah! Something big came out of the Sea of Japan and is attacking a pretty big UN force arrayed against it," Leona proclaimed with all the excitement of a eight year old finding out they got a puppy for Christmas.

"Well, I suppose this is it," Mrs. Hancock said before hugging her daughter tightly for what she prayed would not be the final time. "Please come home safely," she whispered, her tone betraying the heartfelt worry inside her.

"Don't worry mom, I'm not going to die out there," Leona said with absolute finality as she distanced herself from her mother.

"Well, still . . . good hunting," Mrs. Hancock finally decided on.

"Thank you," the five-foot-one-inch teen soldier acknowledged a split second before she disappeared in a flash of blue light.

Mrs. Hancock just stood there in the clearing for a few more minutes, silently absorbing her daughter's call and wondering what the world for them would have been like if her or her husband had never been assigned to the lower levels of the Cheyenne Mountain Complex. Of course, given the chance to change the past – which was a distinct possibility at the SGC – she wouldn't change one thing. After all, if it hadn't been her child selected to be the pilot of a giant cyborg engine of destruction it would have been someone else's, and only God knew if they would have been anywhere close to the expert pilot that Leona was.

With one final sigh of resignation Mrs. Hancock turned back to the camp and starting picking things up. She wouldn't be going back to sleep anytime soon, and she might as well get back home so that she could watch the President's inevitable speech revealing the existence of alien life and the Stargate Program. It was definitely going to be a long day tomorrow.

**

* * *

Women pilot's locker room, Bio-Mech Program Section**

**Sub-level 31, Stargate Command**

**2331 hours, Mountain Standard Time**

"What do you mean I'm not deploying?" Hancock practically shouted.

"I mean just that, Airman," CCM Ramsey responded. "Relations have never been good with the UN, and Japan is UN territory. So unless the blue caps decide to forget the last decade and a half of history between our two nations and let us assist in their operation you're not going anywhere."

"But if and when they do decide to let us help I should be ready to do so," Hancock reasoned.

"Indeed you should, which is why you're going to strip out of your civies, don a quick release jumpsuit and underwear, and then come back up to level 22 and watch the jackboots get their asses handed to them by the giant monster with the AT field on the Fox News Channel in the mess hall with the rest of us," Ramsey spoke in a tone that left no room for argument.

"Yes, sir," Hancock relented before waving Ramsey out of the room and changing. A minute and a half latter she was out and walking towards the elevator with the Sergeant.

**

* * *

Suruga Bay **

**Japan, United Nations**

**August 7th, 2015**

**1522 hours, Japan Standard Time**

It was a peaceful day in Japan, the sun was shining, the air was clear, the cicada was singing, and there was an UN armored column of Type 74 tanks parked along the entirety of the Tomei Expy with their 105mm rifled guns pointed towards the Bay where, coincidentally, at least eight destroyers were stationed. They'd been warned about this day, they had prepared, and now they were about to test their skill and metal against the greatest threat mankind would ever know. They were hungry for blood, and they didn't have to wait long.

Out in the Bay the battle began with a start as a violet-colored lance pierced the _U.N.S. Onami_ dead center, ripping apart the engine room and causing tons of fuel to spill into the ocean, before sharply jerking from side to side and splitting the hull of the _Takanami_-class destroyer in two before retracting down into the depths. Unlike in the movies the ship didn't immediately sink to the bottom of the sea, especially considering the cleanness of the cut, but that was of little comfort to the sailors on-board as their once proud vessel began its descent into Davy Jones' Locker. The attacker, for its part, decided on that moment to make itself known by lifting its form out of the water two hundred meters away from the sinking warship.

It was 190 feet tall with long gangly arms whose fingers fell past its knees, it skin was algae green, and it had sun bleached white bony-like protrusions all over its body that functioned as gill guards on its thighs, shoulder pads of Liefeld-ian proportions, a ribcage on its chest, and a bird-like mask that served as a face mounted right between the gigantic shoulder pads, but its most eye-catching feature was the glowing red orb in the exact center of its chest. It made a large impression on the forces arrayed against it, striking fear into the hearts of men, making children cry and women weep, and it also did a pretty good job of making itself the biggest target dummy on the island – as was evidenced by the hundred plus 105mm tank rounds flying towards it, which were quickly followed by quite a few 127mm autocannon rounds from the _Onami_'s sister ships.

Unfortunately for the UN forces the stipulations of the various scientists connected with the American bio-mech program turned out to be entirely correct. As soon as rounds reached a certain point around the creature they hit the AT-field – acting much like the armor of a T-34 tank – and were deflected off at odd angles away from their target, and in some cases into their allies. The creature's retaliation was swift and brutal: a violet-colored directed energy weapon speared out from the giant's chest along the path set for it by its magnetic containment field and hit the front of the tank column before splitting into the shape of a crucifix in a somewhat clear attempt at psychological warfare, destroying yet more tanks in the process. It then repeated the process with the back of the line, and then strategically applied the beams to the center of the column, all before moving back to the destroyers and their new flying friends.

**

* * *

SGC mess hall, sub-level 22 **

**Stargate Command, United States of America**

**August 6th, 2015**

**2337 hours, Mountain Standard Time**

Hancock winced internally as she continued to watch the UN Air Force's humpbacked "Vincent" heavy VTOLs being slaughtered on international television. All around her similar reactions could be felt from the personnel arrayed in the increasingly crowded mess hall. On some small level they knew they should have furious at the UN commanders for what they were having their troops do, on some small level they knew they should have been disturbed that FNC could position their satellites in such a way as to get crystal clear footage of the battle from several angles, and on some level they knew they should have been supremely concerned that an alien life form of vague origin was rampaging across the Japanese coast, but all they could really do is sit in silence and pray for the men and women dying like animals half way across the globe.

When a group of artillery made up of M270A1 Multiple Launch Rocket Systems was destroyed though one of the members of the Army's SG-25 team finally snapped. "You idiots!" Prt. Lancer yelled in a fit of hysterical rage. "You stupid fucking idiots! You could have been shooting the thing from 50 miles away! Why? Why in fuck's name would you have them engage a target from less then five miles away on open ground?"

It was extremely hard for anyone there to dispute the Private's tirade, the UN commanders seemed to purposefully sending their troops to be slaughtered by the creature the brass in charge of the bio-mech program had long ago designated as an Adaptive Non-Standard Extra-Terrestrial – or ANSET for short – perhaps a political purge was underway? However, even as she watched a wave of "Jenna" bombers drop a series of 100ft long bombs that exploded into 50ft wide blasts – Definitely_ a political purge_, Hancock mused – the Complex's sole pilot couldn't help but find her eyes drawn to a small dark shape on a nearby street corner. Evidently the reporter covering the debacle had the same idea because they both shouted out their observation at the same time as soon as the camera zoomed in on the shape.

"Oh my god there's a kid down there!"

**

* * *

Command Center, Central Dogma, Nerv Headquarters**

**Hakone Geofront, Japan, United Nations**

**August 7th, 2015**

**1609 hours, Japan Standard time**

Commander Gendo Ikari couldn't help but smirk under his iconic tented hands, the UN military was making a complete fool of itself and soon control would handed over to Nerv, then they'd deploy Evangelion Unit-01 with the Third Child, beat the enemy, and snag all the glory and funding.

"It's protected by an AT-field, as expected," Vice Commander Kozo Fuyusuki observed blandly as part of the scripted conversation he and Gendo had practiced beforehand.

"Yes, normal weapons will have no effect on the Shito," Gendo continued, internally giving himself a high five over the perfectly executed exposition done for the monitors.

Over on the second highest platform of the terraced Command Center the phone rang and one of the generals answered, considering the resulting volume of his voice it wasn't hard to find out what the conversation was about. "WHAT? What do you mean Fox News is streaming footage of the battle? How in the world did they find out about it anyways, isn't Japan still under a media blackout?" under his hands and unseen by everyone, Gendo once again let himself have a satisfied smirk. "Uh... Yes, sir, I understand," the General hung up the phone and once again resumed sitting. "Damn those filthy American troglodytes and their insufferable, uncontrollable, news media. All right people, let's wrap it up."

"Right," one of the other generals interjected. "Have the troops lead the target towards Mt. Takanosu, and ready the N2 mine!"

* * *

The leader of the sapient weapons systems plodded its way across the landscape with its own equivalent of a happy skip. The pitiful Tau'ri combined arms forces weren't even putting a dent in its protective field, and it frankly doubted they even knew how. Still, it was just dreadful fun to smash their forces to pieces while on the way to its destination, and it seemed like nothing could ruin its day. Honestly, this was the force that had overturned galactic civilization in less then a decade? It really seemed like they had absolutely nothing going for . . .

_**click**_

_Ah, landmines . . ._

**

* * *

General Landry's office**

**Sub-level 27, Stargate Command**

**August 7th, 2015**

**0320 hours, Mountain Standard Time**

"General?" Sergeant Ramsey said tentatively from the doorstop of Landry's office. "Permission to enter?"

"Granted," Landry answered quickly, downing his second cup of coffee as he did so.

"Sir, has their been any update on the situation in Japan?" Ramsey asked as he stepped into the office.

"The ANSET is currently bombarding Hakone from the crater rim of the mountain," Landry pointed to the screen of his laptop where PJTV was giving a live report on the situation with his now empty mug. "Frankly, I'm amazed that mine did any damage at all, never mind blowing half the damn thing's leg off. However, it looks like it's learned from its mistakes and is now cutting a path with its energy weapon to knock out any more mines that might be in the way – by the way, it finally stopped with the blasted crucifixes."

"So am I to assume that we'll be allowed to assist in this fight now?"

"Negative."

"What?" Ramsey inquired incredulously.

"I called Commander Ikari not five minutes ago and offered our help – with the permission of the President – and he told me that Nerv had the situation completely under control," Landry explained in a tone that said that he couldn't believe the words that were coming out of his mouth. "You, of course, have permission to speak freely on this."

"Under control? Sir, the city's being bombarded by a pissed off giant monster and nothing they have can . . . Unit-01?" both realization and disbelief seemed to dawn on the Bio-Mech Personnel Director's face.

"That would be my guess," Landry said dryly, briefly getting back up to go get some more coffee.

"But how? Pilot Ayamani was severely injured in the activation test for Unit-00, and without her they won't be able to activate Unit-01 . . . unless the Commander's managed to get back in contact with his son since the last intelligence briefing."

"You know, on the one hand I feel I should be praising you on actually reading the intel reports on your Nerv counterparts, but on the other I can't help but wonder if this'll turn into some kind of gossip ring when things inevitably become more public," Landry quipped as he walked back from the coffee machine and sat down at his desk. "Huh, well what do you know? It appears that the two of them really did get into contact with each-other again."

**

* * *

City streets**

**Hakone, Japan**

**August 7th, 2015**

**1925 hours, Japan Standard Time**

With a jerk and a shudder the massive purple form of Evangelion Unit-01 reached the surface and hit the top of its launch restraints, within seconds the locks were disengaged and the massive cyborg took its first step. It would have been a terrific success if it was a technology demonstration, but unfortunately for the pilot this was not a tech demo but rather an actual combat situation. Then, seemingly to add insult to the designers' names, the situation failed as a tech demo as well when Unit-01 collapsed onto the street after it second step.

The Shito, which until then had been regarding Unit-01 with what could only be described as bemusement while bombarding it with half a dozen different sensor sweeps, decided on that moment to simply walk over to the fallen Eva, grab the alleged superweapon's head with its left hand, take the the Eva's left forearm with its right hand, and then crush it, causing a sickening wet crack to ring throughout the streets as the Eva's bones, flesh, and armor snapped. Then, just to add additional injury to the insult, one of the Shito's violet lances appeared from its left forearm briefly before slamming into Unit-01's right eye and exiting on the other side of its head – there was obviously a lot of blood split before the wound cauterized from the heat of the lance.

Seemingly convinced that its enemy had been defeated when the light from its remaining eye went out, the Shito went back to its preparations to blast into the Hakone Geofront with its primary energy weapon. Defying that assumption however, Unit-01 suddenly broke through the restraints around its mouth with a simple flex of its muscles and lept back into action, running towards the retreating Shito with a roar. The Shito, however, was not so easily ambushed and as soon as Unit-01 was within 50 meters it proved this by delivering an extremely fast punch to the purple titan's face, which was quickly turned into a negative by the cyborg when it bit into its opponent's arm with lightning quickness. That's when things got harry.

The Shito began slamming Unit-01 into the ground, using its own bleeding arm as a short makeshift flail, at least until the weight became too great and said arm snapped off like a piece of celery at a vegan's retreat. The enemy of Earth's humans retaliated by sweeping its legs under the cyborg giant, felling it and opening up the way for it to deliver another attack, this came in the form of the Shito's primary energy weapon. A terrific screech filled the air and a glowing white beam shot out of its core, boring into the space where Unit-01 had been just a second before and plowing through every layer of armor the Geofront had in one shot.

Up above, Unit-01 spat out the dismembered arm of the Shito, quickly regenerated its left forearm, and extended the lance held within the arm. The cyborg then came down on the head of the monster, hitting the AT-field for a few tense seconds before following through and driving it down onto its back and into the dirt. Then, in a move that was faster then most humans could see, the purple avenger drove the Shito's arm lance deep into the alien's own core.

Time seemed to stand still in the fortress city. Where once there had been pitched combat, now only stood a frozen scene of gore and brutal heroism. Then, the silence was broken, a deep hearty laugh started to echo through the city, its source evident as the pulsating chest of the Shito. It was disturbing beyond a reasonable doubt, and it rocked the senses of any human that heard it far more then the crucifix-shaped beams ever did, but it was not the final shock the fiend gave its enemies that night. No, that came in the form of a rapidly blinking core, the sudden explosion, and the massive symbol made out of fire that stretched out into the sky and froze the blood of any veteran of the galaxy-wide war eight years prior that happened to be watching.

The Ori, it seemed, had returned.

**

* * *

Homeworld Defense Combat Information Center**

**Sub-level 32, Stargate Command**

**August 7th, 2015**

**0410 hours, Mountain Standard Time**

The atmosphere in the HDCIC was such that it seemed that if one were to honestly try one could slice of pieces of the air due to the tension turning it into a gel-like substance. Almost immediately after the battle in the Hakone streets General Landry had dispatched SG-9 to meet with the Ori embassy on P4J-987 and find out just why in the hell an ANSET had self-destructed into a massive version of the old Ori logo from the bad old days. That had been 40 minutes ago, and they were still waiting for a response back. Nevertheless, the General had decided to take the initiative and had ordered the base to be on high alert for any more ANSETs – it was a purely reactionary measure, but considering that alert they had gotten from the Antarctic three days ago _and_ the attack on Hakone it really didn't hurt to be extra cautious.

At least those were the thoughts of Major Joseph Parsons as he gazed at the screen in front of him. By now practically the entire base had woken up or been called in, the coffee machines had been worked mightily to meet the demands of their increasingly desperate human overlords, and almost everyone was at their necessary stations in the massive CIC – including the GFR Mission Commander, himself. Still, despite the situation he couldn't help but be amused at the response to the situation. He'd read 'the J-Files' same as every other high ranking member of the bio-mech program when he had gotten the job, so he had a pretty good idea of what they were going to be facing in the coming battles, but because of that he'd learned that not only would the ANSETs only be attacking Japan but that the entire scenario would eventually lead to some sort of assimilation plot, and... well, let's just say that it was generally agreed upon that that was the point in the document where the writer started taking some sort of controlled substance. So, really, most of his planning of possible strategies in the then upcoming war had involved strategies for combined mechanized warfare with giant robots, not killing ANSETs.

"Sir?" Technical Sergeant Gale Epperson questioned in a way that was clearly meant to get his attention. "We just received word that the 670th Drone Bomber Wing has lifted off from Carranza Air Base, which brings the total number of operational automated defenses to 73 percent. That's as good as it's going to get for now, sir."

"Glad to have the help, but what about our manned defenses?" It was a strange dichotomy that resulted after the Antarctica Blast, the extreme loss of life had resulted in drone technology being one of the most funded military projects in history, which in turn resulted in massive increases in the production of drones of all kinds with the members of the free trade agreement/mutual defense pact known as the (British) Commonwealth of Nations being the the biggest producers and users. They were still no match for human soldiers, not by a long shot, but for picket defenses and large 'conscript' armies they were perfect. Plus, if they really needed to a human pilot could assume direct command of a drone if the situation warranted it.

"They're scrambling, sir," Epperson explained. "It'll be at least 12 hours before everyone's fully mobilized, but luckily we don't need everyone. As it is we have eight Navy aircraft carriers, five Marine amphibious assault craft, all three Coast Guard aircraft carriers, and all their attached fleets already active, along with 60 percent of all manned air and ground assets."

"Huh, well what do you know?" Parsons mused. "It looks like the President's dick measuring contest with the UN actually paid off."

"It would appear so, sir," Epperson agreed, still keeping the icily professional demeanor about her voice.

"So, how's our pilot, ready to deploy?" Parsons asked semi-rhetorically, it was pretty much a given that Hancock would be ready to deploy at the slightest moment but it never hurt to ask.

"Last I heard, sir, she was sitting down in the locker room and reviewing the footage of the battle on her tablet," Epperson said plainly.

"Of course she was," Parsons replied dryly. "Very well, give me updates on the status of our forces every ten minutes for the next two hours, Sergeant. That is all."

"Sir," Epperson saluted curtly.

Parsons went back to examining his coffee in a needlessly existential manor, if for no other reason then that he simply had nothing better to do barring the ANSETs blasting military intelligence and creepy future knowledge into a thousand pieces and attacking twice in the same night.

"AT field detected! Pattern Bravo! It's appeared in low orbit over the Philadelphia!" Technical Sergeant Amelia Harwood yelled at the top of her lungs from her position on the other side of the large holographic roundtable that dominated the center of the room. "Andrews confirms, definitely a Pattern Bravo."

"Well you know what they say about military intelligence," Parson commented out of the blue, causing several people around him to raise their eyebrows briefly before getting back to work. "What's it doing right now, Sergeant?"

"I don't know, sir," Harwood answered, brushing a single green bang of hair that had gotten out of her brown mop and into her face back into place as she did so. "From what I can tell it's just cruising at 345mph towards the capital."

"Not anymore!" Technical Sergeant Nicola Prichett called out. "Reports are coming in from D.C. that the Pentagon has been struck by a white beam originating from orbit."

"WHAT?" Parsons roared. "I thought the Pentagon had Asgard-grade shielding on it."

"It does, sir," Epperson cut in. "The beam must be of a type that the shields can't block."

"But what could penetrate an Asgard shield without even slowing down like that?" Pichett asked.

"A psychic attack," answered a newcomer, Chief Master Sergeant Walter Harriman – the senior, and token male, member of the bridge bunnies – with General Landry in tow. "We faced a similar attack during the Ori War when they deployed an unfinished prototype capital ship against the _Odyssey_. The crew ended up having severe migraines for at least two weeks afterward due to the side effects from the mental probing by the Prior onboard the enemy vessel. However that ship needed to have a greatly increased power supply just to operate the psychic weapon, never mind the shields, engines, secondary weapons, and life support."

"So it's safe to assume then that the S2 reactor the ANSET is undoubtedly using is powerful enough to power both the AT-field, the weapon, and its own body?" General Landry asked curiously as Walter took his seat around the holotable.

"I believe so, sir," Prichett stated.

"Transmission coming in from the Pentagon," Harwood reported.

"Patch it through," came Landry's immediate reply.

"_. . . Stargate Command, this is Homeworld Security, we're under . . . Oh dear God in Heaven, get that thing __**OUT**__ of my head! . . . Sorry, but this is definitely a psychic attack here. Hey! Don't you dare talk about my son that way! Require immediate assistance," _the voice of the one and only General Jack O'Neill came over the comms, albeit in tone that could only be described as the unholy union of absolute terror and the classic O'Neill brand of snark.

"On the way, sir," Landry responded as soon as O'Neill finished talking. "Major, you have the con, get Hancock to her mech and have her . . ."

"_Uh, actually, this is kind of embarrassing but the attack has stopped, you guys can hold off on the giant fighting robot for now, we really don't need it now. Ah! We do, however, need immediate medical assistance, but we've already got someone calling 911 for that,"_ came back the interruption from General O'Neill, causing everyone in the CIC to look about nervously. _"And before you ask: no, I'm not being mind controlled right now. I do, however, have a nose bleed."_

"He's right, sir," Epperson reported crisply. "The ANSET has broken off its attack vector and is accelerating towards South America at high speed," another series of alarms started blaring in the CIC before Parsons hit the silencer on them. "However, there is another Pattern Bravo coming in off the Atlantic at an altitude of 100ft near South Carolina, looks like it'll make landfall on Hilton Head Island in 10 minutes."

"_Oh, for crying out loud, _stop_ them Hank!"_ O'Neill shouted over the line.

Landry looked around for second, then motioned to Parsons. "OK, _now_ you have the con. Go kick some ass, Major."

"Can do, sir," Parsons replied before waking over to the intercom and calling up the base's lone pilot.

**

* * *

Women pilot's locker room, Bio-Mech Program Section**

**Sub-level 31, Stargate Command**

**August 7th, 2015**

**0415 hours, Mountain Standard Time**

As soon as Hancock got the call she shut down her tablet and sprang into action. Within seconds she was completely naked, save for her dog tags, and walking towards the carefully folded form of her M-2 Neural Synchronization Uniform (NSU). It was form-fitting, insulated, armored with Kevlar and ceramic plates in strategic places, contained all the necessary life-support equipment for up to six hours of vacuum exposure (once the helmet was on), could expand like a regular G-suit to help blood flow, and was donned in less then fifteen seconds, five if one counted the time it took to activate the vacuum seal and make the suit truly skin tight.

After that was done Hancock grabbed her neurohelmet – which resembled a cross between a square-ish motorcycle helmet and a pilot's air mask – and vacuum collar, and ran towards the bio-mech hanger as fast as she could. Two minutes and several flights of stairs later she reached the hanger, and came to a stop five feet away from the command pod. "Is it ready?" the small soldier asked the head technician – Senior Master Sergeant Leon Fox.

"We've been ready for almost ten years," Fox answered happily. "The missile pods are armed with Harpoons, the railguns' ammo banks are filled with HEAP-I rounds, the MAC's capacitors are brand new, the primary naq-acks are powered up, the secondary naq-acks are on stand-by, and all that's needed is for you get in that pod and go kick some giant monster ass."

"Oh, you have no idea just how long I've waited for you to say that," Hancock said in the same voice most people reserved for sex.

The young airman then proceeded to put on her helmet as she walked over to aforementioned pod – apart from plopping the thing on her noggin this consisted of locking her lower jaw guards, donning the vacuum collar, and activating the environmental seals, which did a splendid job of causing the rubber of the oxygen mask part of the helmet to clamp down on her face like some kind of man-made octopus. She got into the pod with little flourish, got the five point harness buckled in over her chest, and moved her body ever so slightly to allow Fox to clip her twin air hoses into their appropriate slots on the seat behind her head, they would provide vital oxygen and other gases to her while in the pod. So, with that done and a quick check of her vitals on her helmet's integrated HUD she gave the thumbs-up to the maintenance crew, which in turn notified them to close the hatch to the command pod and seal the life support systems.

Outside the pod Fox gave the signal for the pod inserter to begin its work. It was actually a rather simple setup – just a grabby bit and a pushy thing, as Colonel Reynolds had once put it – but in this case simple was good, the less complex the system the less chance for something to go wrong and hurt someone. Thankfully nothing like that happened, everything went off without incident and the pod was inserted into the back of _Tyr_, with the twin armor plates folding into place over the pod entrance soon after.

Inside the pod Hancock barely paid any mind to the various chatter going on over the radio. Why would she? She already knew her synch ratio – _92 percent, thank you ATA gene therapy _– she already knew every part of _Tyr_ from head to toe, she already knew the deployment sequence, and she already knew Major Parsons' catchphrase for the situation – _'BioMech lance [insert unit number here], deploy!' Honestly, if there any more _BattleTech_ junkies around here we'd be living in the Inner Sphere_. So instead she occupied herself with personalizing the six different multi-function displays situated around the cockpit as it started to fill with MPAAF and the hanger started to drain of the same substance.

The MPAAF itself was rather interesting. XL-337 was a non-toxic artificial LCL substitute created in the early days of the American bio-mech as a alternative to the LCL used for the Evangelions, since the source for LCL was impossible to reproduce and they really didn't want to have to go sneaking around Nerv HQ with giant buckets every time they needed a resupply. This meant that it had almost all the same characteristics of LCL, but could be manufactured _en masse_ for whatever purposes they may need. It was oxygenated enough to breath, it acted like a fairly good shock absorber, it functioned as a supremely good coolant for the pilot under combat conditions so they weren't boiled alive by either enemy heat-based weaponry or their own weapons' waste heat, it helped the neural connectivity of the pilot and mech along, it was mint flavored, and as an added bonus it was pretty much impossible for a person to break down into protoplasmic ooze in the stuff – though all pilots were still required to not make skin contact with the stuff while inside the cockpit just to be sure, no-one wanted to chance having someone pull a Ikari or Sohryu because the synch rate spiked too high.

As the final phases of the launch were underway, and the old and experienced feeling from _Tyr_ filled Hancock's mind in a way that defied explanation, the walls of the command pod phased into terrific 3-D display of the world from the perspective of _Tyr_'s head, the young soldier recited a prayer her chaplain had taught her and that she had modified to her own situation, and then she spoke over the internal comms. "You ready, Tyr? This is the big one."

"_I have been ready for this day longer then you could possibly imagine,"_ the AI's voice rumbled back. _"Let us smite the enemies of the Tau'ri, and win this day for life and freedom."_

"Glory to God, and victory to the Republic," Hancock intoned, using the American bio-mech program's own variation on Nerv's rather confusing logo.

"_Final locks are released,"_ Sergeant Harriman reported dramatically.

"_Right then. BioMech Lance One, deploy!"_ Major Parsons shouted in an equally dramatic tone.

_Right on cue. The bridge bunnies sure love their theatrics, don't they?_ Hancock mused just a split second before her world turned to white.

**

* * *

Hilton Head Island, South Carolina**

**United States of America**

**August 7th, 2015**

**0620 hours, Eastern Standard Time**

It was a beautiful morning on the Atlantic and the island flanked the sounds, but to the multitude of citizens waking up to the news of the events in Japan they couldn't help but look towards the sea and wonder if they'll be next. The air raid sirens breaking the early morning calm like an ICBM hitting a china shop certainly didn't help matters, and the large black and orange humanoid form rocketing towards the shore only escalated thing, but the giant robot appearing in a flash of white on William Hilton Pkwy. did manage to calm things down in its own bizarre way.

It stood 138ft tall, coated from head to toe in gray and black digital tiger pattern camouflage, with a fulled out form that looked undeniably sturdy and powerful. It had missile packs on its shoulders, two triple barreled direct-fire weapons ports in the chest, a large cannon mounted under its right forearm, and a simple visor-ed head that looked like it had stolen a stereotypical space marine's helmet that stood stoically between the two missile packs like some kind of old defender of mankind's empire. The only clues as to who it was were written on its shoulders and chest, the logos of the SGC, USAF, BL-1, and the Star-Spangled Banner, along with the world _**Tyr**_ in bright white letters, but those were only noticed slowly by the evacuating populace of the town.

The large war machine's opponent was an entirely different matter all together. It stood – or rather hovered – nearly 243ft tall, with a broad humanoid form, a skull-like face that stood in stark contrast to the bird-like mask of the ANSET that had attacked Japan, a black, orange, and white paint job, and two tiny-tiny arms that looked like sheets of printer paper and stood in stark contrast to the self-contained engine of destruction that they belonged to. It was rapidly accelerating towards the shore with its back towards the sun, eager to meet the challenge posed to it by the gray before it.

However, the two giants weren't the only combatants on the field. In the ocean was the _U.S.C.G.S. Valley Forge_, a _Ticonderoga_-class cruiser, and its two escorts – the _U.S.C.G.S. Sides_ and the _U.S.C.G.S. George Phillip_, both _Oliver Hazard Perry_-class frigates – along with the _Zumwalt_-class destroyer _U.S.S. Michael Monsoor_. In the sky there was a full squadron made up of twenty four Boeing FQ-27 Sky Knights armed with four AGM-65G Maverick missiles and two AIM-9X Sidewinders each in addition to their built-in M61 Vulcan 20mm Gatling cannons, with two flights of Northrop-Grumman F-302B Ocelot space superiority fighters armed with four 2000lb GBU-31 bombs and two M-560 .50 railguns each on their way. On the ground there were twelve M270A2 MLRS and twenty M109A6 Paladin artillery pieces of the South Carolina National Guard within 30 miles that were diverted to help set up a coastal defense perimeter. Indeed, while it may have looked like a one on one duel to the media, it was in fact a combined arms battle that would put a previously only theoretical tactic to the test and write a whole new chapter in the history of human warfare.

"_Airman, remember the plan,"_ the Major spoke over the subspace comm channel between _Tyr_ and the HDCIC while an image of his face appeared on her hud._ "Get in close with your AT field, and then when the phase space equalizes . . ."_

"I nail the core with my plasmabeams, I got it sir. You just make sure everyone else knows when to hit that sucker," Hancock cut in with a familiarity born from years of working with the man, mentally coiling _Tyr_'s leg muscles as she did so.

The grizzled thirty-seven year old major simply nodded at this before cutting the connection. That was that, no more words needed to be spoken, it all came down to almost a decade of training and the bond forged between the combatants from that.

With a start _Tyr_ sprang forward almost a thousand feet, leaving two deep footprints in the loamy ground. The ANSET noticed this almost immediately and extended its powerful AT-field to meet the threat, immediately coming to clash with _Tyr_'s own powerful field. A large orange hexagon appeared in the air for a few seconds, moving back and forth ever so slightly as if there was a primordial struggle for dominance going on, then Tyr added the strength of the bio-mech's three back-up Mk. III naquadah generators to the mix. The phase space equalized, and both _Tyr_ and the ANSET's AT-fields ceased to effect the world.

Almost immediately afterward _Tyr_ lurched to side to avoid the arms of the ANSET, the absurdly small arms had unfurled like a Jacob's ladder into what could only be described as toilet paper sheets of death and were now whipping toward the 'pint-sized' bio-mech. In retaliation six bright blue plasmabeams lanced out and hit the ANSET shoulder, Tyr had to shut them down to avoid overheating but it was worth it in the eyes of the young soldier piloting the cyborg to see her enemy's right arm fall off its body and explode into blood. The ANSET shot back with its own energy weapon, it was successful in _Tyr_'s regular energy shields to 60 percent and glassing a portion of the beach, but little else.

By now of course the two combatants had maneuvered so that they had switched positions, a fact that was quickly taken advantage of when the _Monsoor_ fired its two 7in railguns at the ANSET's core. The rounds hit dead on and caused several severe fractures along the core, thus stunning the creature briefly, a fact that was quickly taken advantage of by Hancock, who activated _Tyr_'s jump jets and tackled the ANSET, carrying the both of them into the miniature delta at the center of the island. There were, of course, at least nine RGM-84 Harpoon Block IVs already in the air when Hancock preformed this maneuver, but luckily the missiles' guidance systems were advanced enough that they tracked their target over its new trajectory, compensated, and managed to nail the core when _Tyr_ back-flipped off of the target – luckily keeping its AT field active the whole time to continue to neutralize the target's own.

The ANSET got up and fired its energy beam once again, this time dropping _Tyr_'s to 35 percent and causing a the oceanic inlet behind it to flare up with steam as the beam dug deep down into the sandy floor. Even with that the defenders wouldn't let their enemy rest tough, as the Sky Knights soon evidenced by firing half their compliment of Maverick missiles while _Tyr_ let loose with four Harpoons to split their target's attention. It worked, the ANSET's remaining left arm lashed out and destroyed the Harpoons, allowing 48 Mavericks to get through. As if the chunks of its body being blown apart by the American military's own version of a Macross missile massacre wasn't bad enough it was once again buffeted by 7in, 5in/54, and 76mm rounds from the Coast Guard and Navy ships in the Atlantic.

Inside the cockpit of _Tyr_ a light on one of the MFDs turned from red to green, signaling that the cool-down cycle of the plasmabeams was completed. "Hey, Tyr, open up a comm channel on all frequencies. I want to say something to this bastard before we blast him to smithereens," Hancock said cockily as she dodged the ANSET's tattered arm again.

"_Very well, try to make it quote worthy, will you?"_ Tyr asked as the comm frequency opened.

"Hey big, mean, and stupid!" the ANSET actually turned its head to look at the bio-mech, it was definitely listening. "Here's a tip for the afterlife that you could have really used back here: you fuck with the best, you die like the rest!"

Six blue lances of light crossed the distance between the two giants in less then a second, boring deep into the core of the giant monster, and exiting the other side. The ANSET stood stock still for the briefest of moments, then massive tumors started to bulge all over its body, with the finale coming in the form of a massive explosion of blood a second after that.

"Well, what do you think?" Hancock asked joyfully.

"_I believe I would put that line at a six on a scale of ten,"_ Tyr stated stoically.

"Ah, screw you, that was a nine and you know it," Hancock shot back, joy still quite evident in her voice. "What about you, Major? What did you think?"

Silence was her reply.

"Major?"

"_Uh, sorry about this, Airman, but we're going to have to redeploy you,"_ Major Parson's voice finally responded.

"What do you mean, sir?" Hancock asked curiously.

"_Eight more Pattern Bravos have appeared everywhere from Alaska to McMurdo, plus that ANSET that attacked the Pentagon is swinging around towards Yucatan and jamming all our comms along the way,"_ Parsons reported gravely. _"I'm sorry, Hancock . . . Hancock?"_

Silence was now his reply.

"_Airman? Airman? Dammit, somebody get a confirmation on the pilot's status!"_

**

* * *

Author's Notes**: Whoa. Alrighty then, sitting in at over 13,500 words this chapter is the longest I've ever written, and believe me when I say that it was worth it. This chapter also uses more named OCs then I've ever written in one story, even more then my original stuff from my DA account. Can you believe we're only on the second chapter and have at least four more subplots to introduce? (Wild, isn't it?) Good news though, you'll be seeing a lot more of the NGE and SG characters in the coming chapters and plots, I just thought it necessary to introduce a lot of the OCs first – well, that, and rehashes of Shinji meeting his dad in the Eva cages have been done to death, reanimated, and then killed again over the last decade.

Now, in case anybody is wondering why I didn't have Shinji be picked up in Tokyo-2 or the outskirts of Tokyo-3 like in most fanfics, I have a very good reason for that. Matsumoto City (the city that gets turned into Tokyo-2 in NGE canon) is on the other side of the country from Hakone (which becomes Tokyo-3), and on top of that is the headquarters for the United Nations as of 2007, which would automatically involve far too much politics for our heroes (and the viewer) to handle if it really was attacked by the Third Angel. Now, as for the locations I gave in this chapter for the Third Angel attack, those were brought about from several hours examining the area around Hakone with Google maps – seriously check these locals out, they fit the first episode almost perfectly. Yet virtually no fan fic authors have picked up this, or the fact that Tokyo-3 is on top of a large mountain (with a just beautiful view of Mt. Fuji by the way), weird.

Now, before any asks about why Arael didn't make the heads of everyone at the Pentagon explode, I'll just say that there's a very good reason Gendo refers to her as the "Angel of Information Warfare." As for Hancock, I know that skirting the line of Mary Sue-dom with her very closely, but for some reason I just felt compelled to write a strong female lead (which is rapidly becoming a trope for me), and I figured, "Well, if I'm giving the bad guys a _Death Star_ – a very apt statement considering later events – I might as well give the heroes a lightsaber." As for the SGC's stuff, keep in mind that this is definitely an alternate universe from the main SG metaverse – a term that's actually used in "Ripple Effect," which from the context makes it sound like canon is a spawn point for AUs. Now, as for the rest, just stay tuned and we'll see what happens.

Now time for something fun before the final soul crushing news, there are quite a few references and naming gags in this chapter, can you spot them all? (Answers will, of course, be given away at the beginning of the next chapter.) One final note before I go, I'll be moving down to Texas on the 11th to start college, so updates may be a little sparse for a while, but enjoy this preview in the mean time – try to imagine it being spoken by Allison Keith for that extra oomph.

* * *

The morning wares on as Leona continues to battle against a seemingly endless number of Adaptive Non-Standard Extra-Terrestrials across all of America's territories. During the fight one ANSET begins attacking Stargate Command directly, prompting Commander Gendo Ikari to offer the assistance of Unit-01 piloted by Rei Ayanami, and the President considers the offer. Will he sacrifice Rei's life to save his country, or will he stand firm on his convictions and possibly destroy his people as a result? Next time on FBL: "On All Fronts: The War Comes Home."


	3. On All Fronts

**Disclaimer: **I do not own the Stargate franchise, nor the Evangelion franchise, nor do I claim to. The Stargate franchise is owned by MGM, the Evangelion franchise is owned by Gainax Studios (at least partly), the original characters and concepts in this story are obviously owned by myself, the US President that appears in this tale belongs to another company entirely but which one won't be revealed until the end of this chapter. I'd also like to state for the record that I neither support nor endorse the US annexing Mexico, quite the opposite actually.

**Author's Notes:** Here are the answers to the question from the end of the last chapter. Naming gags: every single one of the OCs that make up the American bio-mech program (USBMP) has a surname that's taken from a ship that served in the Vietnam War, the Coast Guard warships seen at Hilton Head are all ships that were scrapped after the year 2000 in real life, the name for the SG canonical F-302 is drawn from the Grumman tradition of naming all their fighters after felines, the names for the UN aircraft are drawn from the codenames given to Japanese aircraft during World War II (in this case male names are VTOLs and female names are fixed wing aircraft), the chapter title comes from the shape of a thundercloud, and in case you haven't already guessed, every blue water ship name in the last chapter is a ship in real life as well. As for references: Leona already pointed out that the military unit "lance" is a _BattleTech_ term (used to describe a force of four mechs), but there's also Hilton Head (the capital of ComStar in BT) and the design of the GM-206 being heavily reminiscent of the Thunderbolt battlemech; the Sky Knight drones are units launched by the Allied Aircraft Carrier in _Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3_, the formatting of Leona's parent's names is a shout out to Mr. Dr. P. and Mrs. Dr. P. on _Kim Possible_, and I'm sure there are a lot more that I've forgotten about but will inevitably end up being mentioned somewhere on the internet in five years. . . . Last time I'm doing that this story.

_Act I: Opening Moves_

_Part II: On All Fronts_

**Hilton Head Island, South Carolina**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0623 hours, Eastern Standard Time**

"_. . . Damnit, somebody get me a confirmation on the pilot's status!"_ Parson's called out across the HDCIC more than a thousand miles away.

Hancock shook herself out of her stunned stupor to reply as soon as she realized what was being said. "Hancock here, I'm all right, just a little shaken up. Uh, could you repeat the part before that, Command? I'm not sure my comms are in working order."

"_They're working fine, Hancock,"_ Tyr supplied helpfully.

"_I'm afraid Tyr's right, Airman,"_ the Major replied direly. _"Listen, I'll explain the situation to you as you go, but for now we're going to have to beam you to the Salina Cruz Semi-Automated Naval Shipyards."_

"Salina Cruz? Why in the world . . ." Hancock began before being cut off by the white flash of the teleporter.

**Salina Cruz, Oaxaca**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0524 hours, Central Standard Time**

". . . Would an ANSET attack Salina Cruz? These things are supposed to be only attacking targets necessary for starting an instrumentality-class singularity," Hancock continued, her voice purposefully dropping an octave near the end of her sentence when she came to mention the event that would join humanity together into a hive minded slurry of ooze, and inevitably destroy all chance of a future in the process.

"_Why indeed? Why in the world would the ANSETs attack within hours of their last thrust, and do so on the other side of the world as their last target as well?"_ Tyr opined, even as the bio-mech's sensors locked onto the floodlit centauroid creature currently rampaging towards the drydocks – or more accurately, locked onto the massive thermal bloom created by the ANSET's super-solenoid engine and core. It was 150' tall, had smooth white skin with black highlights, four legs that jutted off the side of its abdomen and ended in shovel-like claws, two arms of similar make on its upper torso, a long whip-like tail that ended with a four pronged split barely two inches across, a torso that seemed to move much like a snake, an eyeless shovel-like head that had flared crest of obsidian feathers that ran out from a triceratops-like plate parallel to the top of the skull, and the glowing red hemisphere of the core that sat right at the center of the skull. For the briefest of moments Hancock wondered how it kept its brain from overheating, before deciding that it probably just had some odd organ placement and leaping into action.

In the command pod the young pilot tightened her grip on the twin joysticks that sat on either side of her seat and twisted them to the right on pure reflex, turning the massive war machine around to meet its target head on. Simultaneously her mind flared with the single command, a burning forceful _desire_, to extend _Tyr_'s Absolute Terror Field to meet the barrier of the enemy of mankind now in their sights. Tyr agreed wholeheartedly with her wishes, and so the bio-mech's ATF rocketed forward, crossing the half-mile between the two opponents in a nanosecond. A hexagonal wall of orange energy briefly burst into existence in the think seaside air, but then vanished just quickly as it had appeared as the phase space equalized, the raw power of four third generation naquadah reactors being more than enough to overload the ANSET's own ATF.

The biological weapon of war and genocide wasn't about to suffer the same fate as its counterpart in South Carolina however as it ducked its head down, rolled to its left, and just barely dodged a tungsten penetrator round fired from the Magnetic Accelerator Cannon under _Tyr_'s right arm – which continued on to blast apart the hull of an unfinished _Arleigh Burke_-class destroyer in the drydocks. It had what passed for second degree burns on its upper back from being in proximity to the superheated dart of metal, but was otherwise unharmed, and soon let out its reply in the form of a sweeping energy beam that shot past _Tyr_ and continued on to the fuel depot several miles away. The predawn darkness was then summarily broken by the massive explosion of the fuel refinery and burning of billions upon billions of dollars of military-grade refined crude, the lights from the city having gone dark soon after the air raid alarm had been sounded.

Hancock's mind felt nary a twinge of sorrow over the no doubt colossal loss of life and property, even as her thumbs pressed down on the top right buttons of her joysticks, sending four Harpoon missiles down range at the now rapidly advancing ANSET. It attempted to dodge, but the Harpoons were guided weapons and soon curved back into their target, leaving pitted dark gashes slicked with blood along its lower flanks. If those hits caused the beast any pain though it didn't show it as it continued to zigzag, bob, weave, and sprint towards _Tyr_ at breakneck speed, easily crossing the distance between the two fighters and ramming into the smaller cyborg.

The two combatants went flying, both grappling with each other as they sailed through the air, until eventually they hit the ground with a roar and a tumble. A little more than a mile off-a fleet of about 20 warships that had been scrambled, along with the 15 ships that were maneuvering into open water to avoid being caught in a nautical version of rush hour. All ships turned so that their main guns were pointed towards the wrestling giants. Naturally, they intended to make like their brothers on the East Coast and help the young heroine currently fighting their nation's enemies.

"_Lance Leader, this is Vice Admiral Regonald Trippe on-board the _U.S.S. Port Royal_, I am currently maneuvering the fleet to assist you in the operation,"_ a Texan-accented voice came over the comms in the command pod, causing Hancock to mentally berate herself for not asking for a sit-rep the moment she beamed in. _"Do you require fire support?"_

"Yes, sir!" Hancock immediately replied, even as she pulled down on the duel joysticks triggers and sent 20mm HEAP-I rounds screaming from the four railguns mounted in _Tyr_'s shoulders under the missile packs at mach 10 into the beast that was currently straddling it. "Just make sure to use only guided missiles, we can't afford any more collateral damage," as if on cue, the ANSET managed to get its neck free from the position it had found itself in to avoid _Tyr_ inbuilt weapons systems and mech's own grapples, and promptly fired off another energy beam that blasted apart more of the shipyard. "Oh, come _on_!"

"_Fleet copies, Lance Leader. Missiles are inbound to target,"_ the Admiral replied. Two seconds later that reply was made reality when well over a hundred missiles, mostly BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missiles but with a large number of Harpoons as well, leapt from the fleet on fiery columns of burning jet fuel in arcing paths across the sky. To what few onlookers braved to leave their shelters it looked like a massive wave of fire rising from the water, a truly beautiful sight to those who had lost family to the rampaging abomination.

"Tyr, switch back-up power from the AT-field to the shields, I want them at full power when those missiles hit," Hancock ordered as she maneuvered _Tyr_ so that it was underneath the struggling bio-weapon with arms wrapped around it, which the beast just took as a cue to blast _Tyr_'s head with its primary energy weapon. The pilot shielded her eyes against the terrific glare of the weapon in an instinctual gesture meant to keep her eyes from burning out, even as both her and the bio-mech's helmet visors polarized to counteract the light baring down on them. The missiles continued towards their target unhindered and unabated, at least until the ANSET's tail tip started glowing like a flare on thermal and was flicked away like an armed Model 24 _Stielhandgranate_ with a swish of its tail, which started to rapidly regenerate. Naturally, the missiles followed it towards the thankfully open ground and detonated with much splendor.

"Oh crap!" Hancock shouted in an artificially shocked tone as she flipped the positions of the two giants once again, taking the time to snap her opponent's jaw shut as she did so. "Admiral, don't fire your missiles again. I say again, _don't_ fire your missiles! The enemy is using some kind of beacon in its tail to guide the missiles away from it."

"_Rodger that, Lance Leader. Do you still require fire support?"_ the Admiral asked somewhat hesitantly.

The Airman looked down at one of her MFDs again, and then answered. "Negative on that, sir. I do believe I can handle this myself now," and with that she had _Tyr_ let go of the ANSET, kicked off into the air, and then speared the fiend's core with two bright lances of blue plasma. The explosion of blood came a second or two after that.

"_Well . . . that was anticlimactic. No witty one liner this time?"_ Tyr observed dryly.

Hancock chose not to respond to that and instead switched her comms to the channel between them and the HDCIC. "Where are the rest, Major?"

"_Mexico City, San Francisco Bay, Washington D.C., Seattle, Little Rock, the ANWAR oil fields, and McMurdo. That's two in less than ten minutes though, you're doing good so far, Airman,"_ came back Parson's slightly tired reply.

"There's still more to be killed," Hancock stated simply as she checked her shields. _22 percent and still climbing, good. Dipped into the single digits for a moment there, a few more seconds and we would have gotten a live-fire test of our armor_. "Where to next, D.C.?

"_Mexico City, the shields are up around Washington and the President has ordered the civilians to be attended to first."_

"Roger. Please inform the fleet about that, sir."

"_Will do."_

And with that, the bio-mech once again disappeared in a flash of light, leaving behind a scene of absolute devastation that it was just barely able to contain.

**Mexico City, Tlaxcala Territory**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0527 hours, Central Standard Time**

Mexico City, one would never find a greater hive of scum and villainy. At least that was the way it was headed before 2001, before the Antarctica Blast. For on January 14th, 2001, when tsunamis and earthquakes caused by the Blast rocked the North American continent and the devastated the coasts, the Mexican government and nation was thrown into chaos. The immediate result or the aftermath of this could not have been foreseen by anyone, least of all the people involved in carrying it out, but its aftereffects could clearly be felt by the entire continent, save Canada.

To Carlos Ruy, age 21, though, it was all in the past, a crazy and dark time in his childhood that he would rather forget. Not that the present situation was much better mind you, but compared to half his family dying from the Southern Plague and US armor slugging it out with drug cartels on the city streets the giant flying monster really wasn't all that scary. Granted, it was rather disconcerting that the flying shark/gulper eel/scorpion/gunship thing seemed to be content just to wreck up the place, and the constant air raid sirens were extremely annoying, but Carlos was positive that he'd be able to find his two friends and make it to the shelter before the freak with wings turned its attention his way.

Just to make sure though he quickly brought out his cell phone, opened the address book, and called the number marked **Antonio Sanchez**. It rang twice, and then was answered by young male voice that sounded like someone had gotten into their head that mixing Alaskan and Juarez accents would be a good way to attract the ladies, it wasn't that far off from the truth.

"_Carlos, is that you? Where the hell are you?"_

"Yeah, it's me," Carlos responded quickly, briefly looking up into the sky to see a barely visible white light high in the sky and off to the Southeast. "I'm at the corner of Borja and Quevedo, near the canal. What about you?"

"_Really? We're less than four blocks away. Hold up man, we'll come get you,"_ came back the enthusiastic response.

"'We'? You got Mikhail and Jose with you too?"

"_You bet'cha!"_

"That's great, we can meet up at the Barberini's sports store and then head for the . . ." Carlos was interrupted at time by what had to have been the loudest sonic boom he had ever heard, causing him to immediately and instinctively turn his head towards the source of the sound. It was more than a mile down the street he had been running along, but even still it was hard to miss a giant fighting robot painted in USAF _infantry_ colors shooting at a now rapidly dodging monster. "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Are you guys seeing this?"

"_The big giant robot fighting the big giant monster?"_ Antonio asked rhetorically. _"Yeah, we see it. How could we not?"_

"Well, there are a lot of . . ." the rest of Carlos' reply was cut off by the deafening roar of the city's many anti-aircraft defenses came online for the first time that night, the missiles and railgun fire let loose by the robot certainly didn't help anything. "Hurry up and get over here, guys!" with that he shut off the phone and dumped it back into his pocket, his friends would be there in a few seconds anyway, why waste power?

Unfortunately for Carlos his luck continued the turn for the adventurous that had started that morning, as evidenced by the bizarre bouncing and splashing sounds coming down the canal. Out of curiosity he ran over to railing meant to keep people from falling in, looked down into the man made canyon, and promptly had his eyebrows shoot up in an expression of surprise. _I knew it was a bad sign when I found a sword burnt into my toast this morning_. Down in the rushing water, with a baggy piece of flesh caught on a piece of metal derbies, was a rapidly deploying piece of biological equipment that was remarkably reminiscent of the Mars landers, minus the rover.

Acting instinctively, Carlos looked back over to the battle with the monster to see if the device had effected the battle any and saw that missiles that had previously been the only weapons that consistently hit the beast were now flying straight, arcing up, curving in odd directions, and shooting about just about everywhere but at the target. On a hunch he then took his cell phone back out of his pocket and checked the signal strength, and where once there were five bars now there was none. It didn't take much to figure out what the cause was of the interference, it also didn't take much to formulate a plan to knock the interference out. It did, however, take much for Carlos to explain to his friends his plan.

"You want to do what?" Mikhail Casadora yelled over the anti-aircraft fire as soon as he had an inkling of what Carlos was planning to do a minute and thirty seconds later.

"Swing a grappling hook across the canal, rappel along the line, and then destroy that thing in the canal with this thing," Carlos hefted a crowbar to emphasize his point as he helped Antonio rapidly carry the coil of rope they were going to use out the door of Barberini's. "Why is this so hard to grasp?"

"I think he's just jealous because he didn't think of it first, I know I am," Jose Ortiz supplied in a somewhat helpful tone of voice as he carried a large grapple launcher over his shoulder.

"You would," Mikhail shot back before sighing in resignation, picking up a few repelling items off the shelf, and running after his friends. "I just don't see why we can't just shoot the damn thing, that's all," he continued when he caught up with them.

"Because the nearest gun store is six blocks away, and because our pistols have neither the range nor the power," Carlos answered as loaded the grapple in to the launcher. "That answer your question?"

"Yes," Mikhail said simply.

"Fire in the hole!" Jose called out as the RPG-32 like device he was shouldering fired, thus propelling the four-point grapple across the canal and over the railing on the other side in a superbly done ballistic trajectory.

"Good, because I'm going to be counting on you three to hold the line steady while I go down there and take that thing out," Carlos explained while putting on the rappelling harness.

"All right, but after this we're joining the Army and buying the assault rifles they give us after we get out," Mikhail stated as he gripped the line with Jose and Antonio.

"Can do!" and with that Carlos was off, rapidly putting one hand in front of the other and reaching the space above the device in less than five seconds.

"Well? Don't you two have anything to say?" Mikhail asked of Jose and Antonio.

"Join the Army, get a discount on buying an assault rifle, sounds good to me," Jose answered quickly.

"Yeah, and besides, those Northern girls really dig guys in uniform," Antonio added with a lecherous grin.

Once he was over the device Carlos stopped, locked the pulley on the line, and then dropped down ten feet until he was only eleven inches above the device. Now this was an incredibly delicate piece of equipment, obviously constructed by an alien race on a completely different tech tree then the people of Earth, the slightest misstep could cause a massive explosion or other some such nastiness. It was a very dangerous situation, and there could be only one solution: hit it until it breaks. However, before Carlos did that he ran his through the air near what looked like a grate on the side of the device.

_It's hot_, he realized.

With that thought he jammed his crowbar into the grate and pushed as hard he could until a wet cracking sound filled the air. It was absolutely disgusting, but darn it all if it wasn't a good indicator of progress in breaking things. So, with one great final heave, Carlos broke the bones that served as the grate and tore them away. Now came the easy part, he took out his pistol – a Kel-Tec PMR-30 that he bought as an insurance policy in case he ever ran into the remnants of one of the drug cartels that used to rule Mexico before being run out of town by the US Army – took aim at the glowy bits with the wavy lines coming off of them, and fired. Once, twice, _fifteen_ times he fired, getting halfway through the 30 round clip of 5.6mm Winchester Magnum Rimfire rounds before he hit something vital with the 190 joules of energy being pumped out by each round and caused tumors to start growing all over the device's body. The explosion of blood that followed not only continued the pattern of the monsters' self-destruct mechanisms, but also the pattern of some poor schmuck getting covered in gore when they were activated.

"Not a word," a significantly more blood-soaked Carlos threatened as soon as he was back on solid ground thirty seconds later.

"Who was going say anything?" Jose asked seriously. "You guys going to say anything?"

"No," Mikhail and Antonio answered in unison.

"Glad to hear it," Carlos stated before turning around just in time to avoid seeing a liquid wall of blood cascade down the canal. "Let me guess, the giant monster is dead now?"

"Well they stopped firing, so I'd say yes," Jose answered as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"That's good to hear," Carlos stated, pausing briefly in an attempt to give his next statement more weight. "So, who's up for joining the Army?"

**Little Rock, Arkansans**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0535 hours, Central Standard Time**

"Well, that took far more time than it should have," Hancock observed dryly, wincing slightly as she did from phantom pain in her right side. "And certainly involved more damage than it should have."

"_We may have lost our right plasma beam projectors to the enemy's positron cannons, but the people in that hospital did not lose their lives,"_ Tyr reminded her, a hint of pride creeping into his voice.

_Yeah, and I'm sure those same civvies will be _real_ grateful when the next election cycle rolls around_, Hancock thought sarcastically. "Command, what's the deal with this one?"

"_It's a frost giant, Airman,"_ Parsons began.

"_A jötunn?"_ Tyr asked with a hint of surprise.

"_As good a codename as any I suppose,"_ as if on cue, the marker on _Tyr_'s HUD for the bio-mech's opponent changed from **Target Alpha** to **Jötunn-class ANSET**. _"Anyway, this one's a bit of a strange customer since it forgone wanton destruction in favor of looking for something."_

"Any idea what it's looking for, Command?" Hancock asked as she mentally commanded _Tyr_ to begin moving towards the target that was slowly maneuvering through the city.

"_Yes, as a matter of fact. There was a transport that was moving a shipment of naquadria through the area whose escorts were attacked by the target almost as soon as it got near it just 10 minutes ago. They managed to escape, but the Jötunn has been hunting for them ever since, small wonder why,"_ Parsons exposited sardonically.

"Copy that, Command. I shall begin hunting immediately, all I need are new missile packs and an XM-712," Hancock informed them, even as Tyr disengaged the locks on the missile packs and got ready to yank them off.

"_Lance leader, we've broken open the armory and have six new missile packs at your disposal along with a full complement of basic rifles, we're updating your interface with the specifics as we speak so that you may call upon them at your discretion. Be advised though, these are the _only_ resupplies we can offer you at this time,"_ Walter supplied a second later.

"Rodger that, Command," Hancock acknowledged. "We're switching the packs out now. Will resume pursuit of the target soon after."

"_Lance Leader, be advised, it looks like the target has broken off its search and is heading for you,"_ TSgt. Prichett put in, briefly reminding Hancock of the giant monster trying to kill her, even as _Tyr_ yanked the packs off its shoulders. The empty packs dropped in the air for about twenty feet before disappearing in a flash of blue-white light, even as the loaded packs appeared in a similar pair of flashes in _Tyr_'s hands, from there it was only quick matter of snapping the new packs into place with a firm downward press to the shoulders. After that there was yet another blue-white flash and suddenly a massive, and technically to scale, rifle that's looks could best be summed as the demented love-child of a Mk. 48 machine-gun and a LA-85A1 assault rifle minus the ammo appeared in front of _Tyr_ and was quickly snatched up.

"Lance Lead copies, Command. We're moving to engage the target now," Hancock replied, and with that the 'pint-sized' bio-mech ran off to face its enemy.

As luck would have it, said enemy was walking out of the city and into _Tyr_'s field of view at that very moment. It was 200' tall, all white, covered in what appeared to be fur, and with rippling muscles moving just beneath the skin. Its head looked like an allosaurus skull that had been caught in a Nor'easter, its feet looked more appropriate on a kangaroo than any humanoid, and it of course had a glowing red core in the center of its chest, which was good because Jötunn still looked human enough that it would later be censored in some news reports despite not having genitalia. These thoughts never entered into Hancock's mind however, dodging attacks coming first in her mind after all.

Jötunn stretched out its hand and fired a snowy stream of cryogenic particles at _Tyr_ that no-doubt would destroy any biological system it came in contact with. _Tyr,_ however, had already jumped out of the way and was now flying towards the ANSET on a column of fire. While they were still in the air Hancock's mind flexed with the mental command needed to extend the bio-mech's ATF, and the hexagonal field that marked the equalization of the phase space appeared between the two combatants. As soon as the phase space equalized _Tyr_ steadied the XM-712 in their hands and then, while still in the air, fired.

The air split, the sound barrier shattered, and a blue bolt of artificial lightning leapt from the barrel of the XM-712. The content of bolt was not electricity like real lightning however, instead being made up of countless charged particles accelerated to a fraction of the speed of light. The effects of the beam, despite being about as subtle as someone wearing a neon pink Bart Simpson costume to the IRS, were surprisingly hard to discern without highly specialized equipment capable of filtering out the electromagnetic distortion filling the local atmosphere in the split second the beam was airborne. The aftereffects of the beam however were almost stupidly easy to figure out: one destroyed core, a massive explosion of a blood – or blood-like substance – and the particle projection cannon research lab personnel at Area 51 doing the "In Your Face" dance for an hour straight around the base.

"Time!" Hancock demanded as _Tyr_ landed in an empty street and she had the heat-damaged XM-712 recalled back to the armory.

"_From initial sighting to conflict resolution? Four seconds,"_ Tyr reported with a hint of amazement.

"Yes! Back on schedule," Hancock cheered. "Next stop, Oakland!"

And with that, the giant bio-mech teleported away, leaving behind a surprisingly untouched city, and a small lake of blood flowing through said city's streets.

–

–

**Alameda Naval Complex, Oakland, California**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0337 hours, Pacific Standard Time**

Sr. Airman Hancock shook her head slightly as she found herself once again found herself two-thirds of the way across the continent in the blink of an eye. It was a slight bit of disorientation, nothing more, but it could still spell disaster in a combat situation. So, on that happy thought, the gold eyed pilot once again habitually thanked God that the 'bridge bunnies' had the foresight to direct the teleportation network to beam her in _away_ from the battle.

"Tyr, status?" Hancock asked as she located the target on the MFD set aside for the thermal sensors.

"_Still in one piece, shields at 98 percent and climbing, target located in the bay South of Treasure __Island, one Coast Guard destroyer heavily damaged by the target's acid attack, one Navy artillery sub crippled by one of the target's legs stepping on it, the ANSET is currently poisoning the water in the bay, and as for cover, we are perfectly . . . exposed,"_ Tyr said moments before its statement was punctuated by the ANSET spraying a stream of rapidly evaporating green liquid at the synchronized warriors.

"Whoa!" Hancock exclaimed as _Tyr_ automatically dodged the stream of deadly toxins by activating its jump jets. "Almost four miles. I think we got a new record holder for the longest ranged chemical thrower in history."

How the aforementioned target achieved this though was anyone's guess though, since it looked more like a four-legged daddy-long-legs that went overboard with painting fake eyes on its main body then any kind of chemical thrower. Still, the sheer size of the thing probably had a lot to do with its ability to project its weapons systems. It was over 1200ft high at the apex of the legs, 300 feet long at its main body, and over 3000 feet across with its legs spread out.

"_Sweet Christmas, that thing is huge!"_ Parsons exclaimed over the radio.

"Sir, don't you have a sensor lock on these things already?" Hancock asked as she flicked through the selection of deployable weapons while advancing towards the target. _VW-1 vibroknife? No. XM-31 pistol? No. Naquadria macuahuitl? Oh hell no._

"_We do, but seeing it in person, so to speak, is just so much more forceful,"_ Parsons explained before continuing. _"And before you ask about the visuals, we're working on it."_

"Thank you, sir. Hate to die because of an intelligence error," Hancock replied before activating _Tyr_'s jump-jets and checking the HUD for nearby allied units. _Sonic glaive? That's one of Nerv's weapons! Come on, there's gotta be something here that's effective, and not stolen, or locked in development hell. Replacement 20mm HEAP-I railgun ammunition? No, not now._ _XVW-4 monomolecular vibro-chainsword . . . Thank you, Lord._

"_Lance leader, I don't have to tell you this, but I'll do it anyway. Be careful with that thing! God only knows just how expensive it really is,"_ Parsons said, the muttering under his breath about _Warhammer_ fanboys and the DOD that followed soon afterward was thankfully not picked up by the microphones.

There was a flash of light near the apex of _Tyr_'s jump, and suddenly a chainsaw that looked like it had been modeled after a Roman short sword appeared in the air and quickly began falling, only to be caught by the bio-mech's left hand. One contiguous thought later and the experimental weapon roared to life with the ferocity of a rabid tiger. The GM-206 hit the ground hard soon afterward, immediately coiled its legs, and then jumped off towards the target again with its jump jets igniting soon afterward.

"Tyr, contact the Navy and get their subs to ready their heaviest torpedoes. This ol' tree's coming down!" Hancock called out, her gold eyes shining with a predatory malice as _Tyr_'s ATF neutralized the defensive barrier around the gigantic alien.

A stream of the green acid lanced out from the ANSET, hit _Tyr_, and rolled off the bio-mech's shields without causing any damage. The pholcidae-like monster tried at the last moment to move out of the way, but at the speeds involved it was simply too little too late. The absurdly designed melee weapon collided with the thin leg of its target, immediately digging in and shredding apart flesh and bone analogs with abandon. The blades of the chainsword tore through the leg in less than a second, quickly causing it to tumor up and explode into blood, and the bio-mech crashed down onto North Gate Road on Yerba Buena Island.

As soon as _Tyr_ hit the ground it coiled its legs again and jumped on a trajectory that brought it into contact with the ANSET's next leg as it was retreating towards the deeper part of the Bay. The man-made engine of destruction hit its target like a ton of bricks to a plaster wall, and quickly gained a foothold on the fiend's body that enabled the bio-mech to delimb it once again, this time bringing it crashing down into the Bay from a lack of support.

_Tyr_ pushed off the sinking alien and once again had its jump jets activated. _"Open fire!"_ came the call over the radio.

All across the Bay the Navy's five manned submarines and over twenty unmanned combat submersible vehicles (UCSV) that were in range let loose with a barrage of supercavitating torpedoes that crossed the ten thousand foot difference between them and their target in less than five seconds. The 'fish' were a mix of Mark 62 lightweight torpedoes meant to propel themselves in excess of 280 knots and deliver most of their punch in the form of kinetic energy, and the far larger Mark 64 'Spine-breaker' superheavy torpedoes meant to propel themselves along at 170 knots and deliver most of their punch in the form of their 4,000lb explosive warhead. Needless to say, the series of blasts that punctuated the ANSET's demise were quite spectacular.

"Score one for the Humboldts," Hancock said appreciatively as she and her partner stared back out across the Bay from the slightly more wrecked Treasure Island Road. "Command, Lance Leader: target is destroyed, and we're moving onto Seattle."

The only answer the young woman received was in the form of static.

"Command?" Hancock asked again. "Tyr, can you get anything?"

"_Negative, Airman. I can't get any reply on any channel in Colorado, it looks like they're being jammed,"_ Tyr reported.

_Pentagon's out of action, Command's being jammed, what to do?_ Hancock thought to herself. "Tyr, connect us up to the Groom Lake Command Network, and then let's get onto Seattle."

"_Aff, Lead,"_ Tyr responded as he made the necessary data prompts.

"Ah no, not you too," Hancock whined just before _Tyr_ disappeared in a flash of white.

–

**White House Command Bunker**

**Washington D.C.**

**United States of America**

**0639 hours, Eastern Standard Time**

"What's the pilot's current status?" the President asked as he looked across the holographic display table that showed the current battle in Seattle.

"The life support systems are reading an increased level of endorphins in her system, but other than that nothing of note. If her psych profile is correct she's probably in heaven right now," Warrant Officer Graffias responded.

"I can buy that," the Secretary of Defense said humorously, remembering the time he met the pilot in question a few months beforehand.

"What about the SGC, have you been able to get in contact with them yet?" POTUS continued, wrapping his hands on the guard rail that went all along the holographic table's sides.

"Negative, sir," the Warrant Officer responded. "However a spy satellite will be in range in 30 seconds, shall I put it up on screen?"

"Does a porcupine eat tree bark?" the leader of the free world asked rhetorically, only to be met by blank stares from most of the people in the room. "Of course it does!" he roared. "Good gravy, doesn't anyone watch the Discovery Channel anymore?"

"Uh, roger, sir," the Warrant Officer acknowledged before flicking the appropriate switches, causing an image of a region in the twilight covered Rockies to appear on the one of the seven 50" LCD televisions set up around the room. Soon after the image was brought up Graffias entered a series of prompts into his computer's command console, causing the image to zoom in on the 10 mile radius around Cheyenne Mountain. It was still a rather calm image, but now there were obvious signs of movement through the heavy Colorado forestation. Graffias tapped a single key and suddenly the image switched to a thermal cam.

"Dear God in Heaven," SECDEF breathed.

"Well, shit," the President said simply.

The screen was now dominated, at least in attention grabbers, by a massive thermal bloom that was moving in the direction of the Cheyenne Mountain Complex. The image changed again, this time switching to a light amplification mode and bathing the whole scene in green. The source of the bloom was a massive snake-like beast, at least 700' long from nose to tail-tip, that was quite obviously an Adaptive Non-Standard Extra-Terrestrial. Considering what was in its war path the people in the bunker had every reason in the world to be worried, _there_ really was just a cornucopia of valuable alien artifacts after all. Still, it could have been worse, there could be a blue singing diamond attacking Area 51.

"Is that what's causing the jamming?" the Secretary of Defense asked curiously.

"No, sir," Graffias answered quickly. "That would be this," he switched back to a non enhanced view and then zoomed the image out again until nothing on the ground was visible. There, flying at 10,000ft, was the unmistakable form of a glowing white bird the size of a _Daedalus_-class battlecrusier.

"That red bastard!" POTUS yelled at the top of his lungs.

As if responding the President's outburst the screen flickered and sputtered with static before resolving itself into a logo that had a utahraptor's foot superimposed on something resembling the Ori's old icon with two thunderbolts on either side if it on top of an off-white backdrop.

"Crap!" Graffias exclaimed. "The cheeky bastard hacked our satellite!"

"Well get it back!" SECDEF shouted, frustration clearly seeping into his voice. "Get Hiemdall and Sif to help you if you can, but get that satellite back!" Then, almost as an afterthought he added, "And whatever you do, don't let that thing gain a hold of any more of our systems."

"Sergeant, could we beam something into the area being jammed?" the President asked of one of the techs.

"In? Of course sir, that's simply a matter of getting the math right if we use the right satellite. Out? Not a chance in hell as long as that ANSET's jamming is active," the tech answered.

"Thank you, son," the President said before turning his attention back to his own thoughts. _So, either we sacrifice the rest of the targets in return for saving Stargate Command, or we wait for Leona to finish killing the rest of these bastards and pray that Cheyenne Mountain's shields hold until then. It's times like these I really wish for a third option._

"Sir, the ANSET attacking the shields has broken through, it's in the city now!" yet another of the techs reported.

POTUS sucked in his chest and a deathly silence overcame the room for a full five seconds, then the President spoke. "OK everybody, let's pack up. There's no sense standing here like a static target, and BROKEN HIVE protocols are now in effect so you know what that means," and with that everyone in the room began moving to their predetermined task as fast as possible.

"Mr. President, we have to get you to a secure location," Davidson, the leader of the President's Secret Service staff, said grimly.

"Very well," the President resigned. "Can we at least heroically flee in terror in the Paladins though?"

"Yes, sir. Lord knows the boys down in the motor pool had been clamoring for the chance to try them out in a combat situation."

–

**King County, Washington**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0339 hours, Pacific Standard Time**

"Tyr, I think I'm in Hell. I've died, my spiritual paperwork wasn't in order so the Good Lord rejected my residency application, and now I'm in Hell," Hancock said in manor that came across as completely serious.

"_Your jokes are getting better Airman, but don't you think that statement is a little extreme?"_ Tyr responded deftly.

"Tyr, we're being shot at with missiles and lasers from a giant alien that looks like it just stepped off a Strana Mechty proving ground. If I'm not in Hell, then the universe has officially jumped the shark," Hancock shot back with faux anger as _Tyr_ maneuvered behind a building just in time for a series of small missiles to pummel the side of the structure in an attempt to get to the bio-mech.

It had been going on like this for at least thirty seconds after they had beamed in, neutralized the enemy's ATF, and promptly had their shields taken down by the ANSET and its throwable exploding tail – how in the world an exploding tail wrapping around them could have brought down _Tyr_'s shields without leveling the city Hancock had no idea, she was a soldier not a scientist after all. The ANSET quickly capitalized on the lack of shields provided by its previous attack and launched a barrage of long-range missiles that managed to score some minor damage to _Tyr_'s legs. _Tyr_ replied in kind with a barrage of five of their own Harpoon missiles that scored medium damage to the ANSET's left shoulder that would surely be regenerated shortly given the chance, and then switched to railgun fire just in time for the target to back behind some buildings.

They had to end the battle, and they had to end it quickly. Not just because they had other places to be, not just because the chance of them failing the mission thanks to a severe case of death increased, but also because their battle was causing a large amount of damage to the city's infrastructure – indeed, the very act of walking caused streets to break under _Tyr_'s 450 Imperial sort ton weight – which would inevitably come back to bite the Air Force in the PR division. _And, of course, that would eventually lead to budget reductions because the higher-ups had the brilliant idea to place themselves under civilian control_, Hancock thought sarcastically with the smallest and deepest part of her mind as she rapidly worked out a way to defeat the ANSET.

Silently, and with hardened steel in her eyes that wiped away all pretenses of humanity, Hancock moved her joysticks forward.

_Tyr_ jumped out of cover and bolted down the street, tearing up pavement and concrete as it did so. The relatively small bio-mech then turned down another street that was pointed towards the Bay and found its target advancing towards the body of water, presumably to use the cooling and material resources of the water to speed its regeneration. Whatever the purpose behind the ANSET's movements however, it never got the chance to enact it, having left its back exposed.

A flash of heat filled the cockpit ever so briefly as the reactors channeled energy into the cluster of the three remaining Asgard plasma beam projectors in _Tyr_'s chest, causing them to create a trinity of bright blue-white lances of solar hot plasma and energy that reached out and penetrated deep into the back of the hunched over biological weapons system that fancied itself an enemy of the wayward colonial power that shook the world. The beams dug deep, vaporizing flesh, and bone, and nerves, and fluid vessels, and armor analogs, and all that stood in their path. In less than a second after the firing button had been pushed the beams had carved a melted and triangle-shaped hole in the rear of the ANSET that bored all the way through the body before exiting and melting through the street. The core of the mech-like life form was also destroyed along the way, thus leading to the streets being painted dark red less than ten seconds later.

"2HDCIC, _Tyr_; target destroyed; moving to next area of operations," Hancock reported in the most mechanically ecstatic manor possible.

–

**Washington D.C.**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0650 hours, Eastern Standard Time**

"Sir, we've got a call for you on line six, its Commander Ikari," Davidson reported as the M40VC Paladin Presidential Command Vehicle and the other M40 Paladins in the convoy turned a corner.

"Put him on, and get our trump card over here while you're at it," the President said with a smile as he took a nearby car-phone into his right hand while Davidson started writing out a text message on one of the vehicle's built-in computers.

"_President Ackerman, how nice to hear your voice again,"_ the suave voice of Commander Ikari Gendo of Nerv came over the line.

"Rokubungi, I didn't expect that you'd be calling us on this fine August morning! Did your ego finally burst from overgrowth?" Ackerman asked jovially.

"_Now, Howard – do you mind if I call you Howard? – there's no reason to be rude. I was just calling to tell you that I have a solution to your giant monster problems,"_ the Commander explained, sounding far too cool for school in the process.

At that moment a large amber hexagon flared into life in front of the ANSET. Five seconds later the hexagon disappeared, and the alien bio-weapon was immediately set upon by autocannon fire.

"Really? Well I have to say Rokubungi that I'm not really sure how you can do that. After all, we have to situation completely under control."

Across the Potomac from the ANSET a column of M12 Crusader tanks opened fire with their 120mm smoothbore cannons. The ANSET retaliated with a particle beam but hit only energy shields and asphalt. Up above two F-302B Ocelots dropped their payloads of four 2,000 lb bombs each onto the rampaging target with pinpoint accuracy and blinding speed.

"_Are you sure? Because it looks to me like you've lost contact with Colorado," _once again the words rolled off his tongue with the ease of years of practice.

"Come on, Rokubungi, I've been in worse situations before. Remember Grenada?"

The ANSET's stance buckled somewhat as it was immediately set upon by a barrage of 155mm artillery shells, followed by 96 Maverick missiles launched from the swarm of orbiting Sky Knights.

"_Yes, I still have the scars to prove it,"_ Ikari replied. _"And could you please stop calling me Rokubungi, I've been an Ikari for fifteen years after all. Hell, you were at the wedding!"_

"Really? Well gosh-darn-it, in all the excitement it must have slipped my mind," Ackerman said with a swing of his arm and a roll of his eyes. "In any case, what do you think the chances of me actually calling you that are?"

The ANSET held its broken arm in front of its chest to protect its core as the Paladin convoy fired off a few passing shots of 155mm jet-assisted shells from their main guns.

"_Slim to none, but it never hurts to try,"_ Ikari sighed. _"Which is why I have to ask again, will you let us deploy Evangelion Unit-02 to help secure Colorado?"_

High above the city and the dueling forces a Boeing YAL-2 Airborne Particle Beam Test Platform angled in on an approach vector towards the ANSET.

"Not a chance," Ackerman answered with finality.

"_What?"_ Ikari responded with a bit of incredulity.

"Well, the way I see it, the UN is on the road to Communism. I don't do business with Communists. Nerv is a UN entity. You are the commander of Nerv. Therefore I cannot do business with you," Ackerman said as the convoy he was in.

"_. . . Your logic is flawless, but its also misplaced, Howard. I'm not doing business with you, I'm trying to help you,"_ Ikari reasoned.

"I really don't see much difference between the two," Ackerman said back, briefly bracing himself against a sudden burst of acceleration.

"_You're just being stubborn, just like you were back in Manila when you refused to take out the trash on Thursdays,"_ Ikari admonished, his voice raising in volume slightly.

"Hey, we agreed when we got that apartment that I would take the trash out on the odd numbered days of the week. Thursday is the fourth day of the week!" Ackerman said as he leaned forward and started shaking his finger at the tank commander's back, much to the confusion of the gunner.

"_The week starts on Sunday, Howard,"_ Ikari stated, the volume of his voice raising even higher.

The ANSET turned to shoot down a flight of attacking gunship drones as it became more and more agitated, while at the same time leaving itself open for an attacked launched from thirty miles away.

"Bullshit, it starts on Monday, that's the way it's always been," Ackerman said hotly.

As the argument between the two old friends became more and more inane as a bright blue lance of light shot down at a 45 degree angle from the sky and bored a perfectly round hole through the core of the ANSET. The light of the core blinked and flickered for a moment, and then the metallic skin of the bio-weapon started to buckle and break, large tumors sprung up under the natural armor as it snapped apart and then . . . the dam broke. The tumors exploded, sending thousands of gallons of the now familiar blood-like substance flowing across the street, while at the same time the skin shattered into thousands of pieces that quickly broke apart into a fine dust that scattered to the winds.

**South Alaskan Proto-Glacial Oil Field, Alaska**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0244 hours, Alaskan Standard Time**

Alaska, largest state in the federation known as the United States of America, once this pristine state was known for its vast and beautiful untamed wilderness, now it was known only for the herculean struggle by the oil companies to extract as much of the vital fuel from the ground as possible before the ground was locked away by the rapidly advancing glaciers whose development was accelerated by the aftermath of the Antarctica Blast – it was a PR nightmare for the state, in other words. Unto this shrinking tundra rolled an alien weapons system unlike anything the world had seen in thousands of years. It was big, it was round, it had many legs, and every fiber of being seemed to be armored. It also looked rather like a pill bug.

The gigantic isopod-like creature ceased its rolling for a moment, fell to its left side, and then unfurled into its full form, taking a moment to straighten itsself out as it did so. The giant construct was almost 400' long, 100' high, and generally maintained the appearance of a member of the armadillidiidae family. Nevertheless, it was still an Adaptive Non-Standard Extra-Terrestrial, and as such still had the distinctive glowing red core that almost all ANSETs used for power generation and computation power. This set-up, while useful for occasions where it would need to regenerate significant portions of its body, generated a significant amount of heat. To counteract this, the ANSET would occasionally unfold to allow the core to be ventilated and cool. However, due to the threat of enemy weapons fire in the event of its ATF being taken down the ANSET elected to drag its core through the snow and ice with its armored back to the sky instead of flipping over onto its back to allow its core to air cool.

It was onto the scene that the bio-mech _Tyr_ appeared.

"Tyr, current status of the target?" Hancock asked coolly as she observed the scene before her, taking special note of the river of water forming behind the target, as well as the aircraft from the Alaskan Air National Guard that had taken up positions around it.

"_Currently one mile away from us and moving at 20 MPH towards the main oil pipeline. It has already destroyed three auxiliary pipelines, though it is unlikely to be able to go on another attack run while it is cooling down. The Air Force has a flight of B-52s armed with Tomahawks and JDAMs orbiting and ready to assist,"_ Tyr reported.

"Hmm. Tyr, what do you think our chances of flipping that thing over are?" Hancock asked as she examined the sensor and power readouts on the cockpit's MFDs.

"_Fairly good, but we'd have to move fast once the target's ATF has been taken down,"_ Tyr responded as the bio-mech's leg muscles tensed.

"Doable," Hancock said in the same monotone she'd been slipping in and out of for the majority of the battles.

And with that they were off. Deep holes were dug into the tundra as the bio-mech shot off towards its target. A hexagon of orange light appeared briefly before disappearing, and then _Tyr_ his its target like a freight train. It quickly dug its hands under the ANSET's carapace, and flipped it over with a grunt . . . allowing the target the opportunity to curl into a ball at angle that allowed it to move around.

_Tyr_ fired of a trio of plasma beams that lanced out and licked the side the ANSET's shell, just barely melting off a foot of armor in the process. Less than three seconds after that a deluge of AGM-114R Hellfire II missiles shot out from the AANG drones orbiting the target, while the Boeing B-52H Stratofortresses each fired off a pair of Tomahawks. The Hellfires did next to no damage, and after the first wave hit the ANSET rapidly deployed a series of groves and spikes in its back, and took off. The target quickly accelerated to 100 MPH and started to move towards the main line, as it was doing so however the quartet of cruise missiles fired from the B-52s impacted the ANSET's side. Three of the missiles hit the armor, but the fourth managed to thread the needle produced by the gap in the center of the rolled-up carapace and hit something other than armor. The ANSET opened its body slightly after that, and gave off a howl of pain.

Less than a second after the howl reached its ears _Tyr_ accelerated its run in pursuit of the target. Its legs stretched, its arms pumped, it practically flew out in front of its target, and then it activated its jump jets. The small bio-mech flew through the air on a column of fire, and then when it reached a certain height it activated its maneuvering thrusters – dozens of ion engines that sat all across its armor and were designed to allow finite movement at fantastic speeds in the vacuum of space, now repurposed on the fly to do the same in an atmosphere. The thrusters flared hundreds of times in the span of two seconds as the metal giant drifted across the sky, causing it to twist and turn at odd angles. After it had found its place though three bright lances of light shot out from its chest and flew through the small gap in the ANSET's armor.

The giant armadillidiidae-like creature bucked into the air, and opened up before exploding into a shower of blood. The grand exception to this was its carapace, which fell to the ground with an Earth-shattering boom. The creature's killer followed soon afterwards, albeit disappearing in a flash of light when it hit the ground.

**McMurdo Air Force Base**

**United States Territorial Holdings, Antarctica**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**2247 hours, New Zealand Standard Time**

If anyone had told the personnel stationed at McMurdo Station in the Twentieth Century that one of the most common weather phenomenon they'd be facing were a combination of thunderstorms and blizzards they'd have told you that your mind had gone wondering off the ice shelf. However, if had asked one of the people living at McMurdo Air Force in 2015 about what was the most common weather pattern in the region they would have said exactly that. It was impossible, it was unique, and it was just one more remainder of how they had failed to stop one of the biggest tragedies in human history – as if the oddly shaped melted ice cap wasn't enough.

It just so happened that one of Antarctica's famous thunderblizzards was in effect at that very moment. The wind was howling in excess of 50 MPH, the snow was near whiteout conditions, temperatures were well below freezing, and a bolt of lightning would punctuate the sky every twenty seconds. Add in the eternal darkness of the Antarctic winter, and the scene was nothing but inhospitable for any human caught in the storm. Luckily for the personnel inside the complex though they were protected from harm by a large Asgard-grade energy shield that encompassed both the base and the surrounding area, both from the storm and from the ANSET that was assaulting the area.

It was giant bioluminescent double-helix connected to itself in such a way that it formed a halo of twin alternating ribbons. Its body glowed with an ethereal blue light, and every so often it would uncoil and transform into a single white ribbon that would lash out and strike the shield. Again and again the ribbon would lash out and strike the shield, causing large flashes of light to appear and disappear in the blink of an eye.

Onto this scene appeared the bio-mech _Tyr_ and its pilot, ready for the fight.

"Tyr, please tell me we are nearing the end of this conflict," Hancock breathed robotically.

"_Only this target, the attacker of Cheyenne Mountain recently designated Jörmungandr, and the ANSET's air support remain,"_ Tyr stated in a voice that sounded far older than when they had begun that morning. _"We shall save Stargate Command, but Leona this enemy is . . ."_

"I know what it is, but that doesn't matter. I never give up on my mission unless ordered to by a superior officer, and none have ordered me to do so yet," Hancock said with mechanical conviction.

"_. . . Very well, Airman. Let's kill this thing before it does the chance to do any damage,"_ Tyr responded with what sounded like a grunt.

"Relax, Tyr, we can eliminate this easi . . ." Hancock was interrupted by the double-helix suddenly uncoiling and striking out through the shield without any visible impediment beyond a colossal flash of light that momentarily blinded _Tyr_'s visual sensors. The Wolverine bio-mech held out its left hand in an instinctive gesture to try and shield its eyes, just in time for the oscillating ribbon to slam into and start boring into _Tyr_'s left hand. Its shields and ATF were completely ignored, and the armor did little to impede the parasite's progress.

Acting quicker than she could think Hancock had _Tyr_ grabed its chainsword off its left hip with its right arm, turned it on, and slamed it into her left shoulder as hard as possible. The pain was . . . indescribable, the young pilot had never before experienced such pain. She could feel every single vibrating monomolecular blade digging into her shoulder, she could feel the ligaments being torn in two, she could feel her bones being shredded apart, she could feel her muscles being torn like a poorly made rag doll, she could feel the neuron's connections being cut off, and she could feel her blood vessels bursting. She could feel everything, and those feelings combined created a sensation that no human ever wanted to feel.

_You are a weapon who is working towards their own obsolescence_, an alien voice inside Hancock's mind flaunted. _Even now you accelerate your own decommissioning. How curious._

The chainsword cleared through the shoulder in less than three seconds, despite feeling like much longer, and the corrupted limb fell to the ground. _Tyr_ then quickly turned, back peddled slightly, and unleashed an Alpha Strike on the limb and the wriggling ribbon attached to it, firing all of its weapons as fast as it could. Combined with the fire from the base defenders it wasn't long before the limb and its parasite were a melted and bombed out wreck.

In the command pod though things were going far worse. Hancock's vision was burly, she could not keep her grip on the control sticks, she couldn't feel her left arm, and she could barely comprehend the visor in front of her face.

"_Hancock!"_

The last sound Leona heard before the darkness surrounded and claimed her was the sound of her heartbeat monitor flat lining.

–

**Secondary Homeworld Defense Combat Information Center**

**Groom Lake Testing Facility, Nevada**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0349 hours, Pacific Standard Time**

"What's the status of the pilot?" Colonel Davis barked out as the sound of Senior Airman Hancock's heart monitor's warning tone continued to fill the air.

"Tyr's using the defibrillator on her now," Tech Sergeant Schofield reported as the feed to _Tyr_'s command pod showed the body of the Airman in question bucking in her seat. "Wait one . . ." the infernal whine of the heart monitor finally died down, replaced by a steady beep. "The pilot's heart has started beating again."

"Good. Now let's bring her on home," Davis spoke with finality. What a hell of a way to start his tenure as temporary commander of a secondary command center.

"_No . . . sir,"_ came the soft pleading reply over the comm. _"I need . . . to finish the mission."_

"The Airman has regained consciousness," Schofield reported, prompting one of the other Tech Sergeants to roll their eyes.

"Airman, you are no position to argue this. Hell, you're barely in a position to walk!" Davis reprimanded.

"_I'm the . . . only person who can do this. Colonel, please sir, we can't just let Stargate Command fall,"_ Hancock choked out, her voice gradually getting steadier as she continued.

"_Hancock is right, Colonel. Right now we're the only force on this planet that can stop Jörmungandr from destroying one of our country's most valuable defense assets,"_ Tyr added.

_Frak, it was so much easier dealing with Airman Ajax_, Davis sighed to himself. "I'm not going to send you two out to die in an impossible fight. You _are_, after all, the only force we have right now capable of beating the ANSETs."

"Sir, incoming deep-space burst transmission, audio only, the imbedded IDC says it's the _Odyssey_," Schofield interjected.

"About time they showed up. Put it on," Davis said with an ever so slight smile.

"_Command, this is _Odyssey. _We have the package_ _aboard and we beginning our approach into Earth orbit. Be advised that the package is live. Repeat, package is live,"_ came the voice of the _Odyssey_'s commander over the 2HDCIC's speakers.

"_Colonel, you don't have to send us to die. You just need to have us keep Jörmungandr occupied until the package can be delivered,"_ Tyr said sagely.

Davis' face muted up into one of concentration. _Definitely easier dealing with Ajax._ "Very well. Sergeant, send a message to the _Odyssey_ and tell them where to drop the package. Airman . . . you're cleared to beam in, keep the enemy away from Stargate Command, but for the love of God keep safe out there."

"_Thank you, sir,"_ Hancock and Tyr answered in unison.

–

**Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado**

**United States of America**

**August 7****th****, 2015**

**0455 hours, Mountain Standard Time**

Nights in Colorado always tended to be cool, that was indisputable, after the Antarctica Blast though those nights had become even colder thanks to global cooling. On the night of the first engagement the state had with an ANSET however the early morning air had turned uncharacteristically hot. The reason for this was not hard to grasp at, especially since it was a thousand feet long and shooting plasma from its mouth.

Jörmungandr was a massive creature similar to a centipede in some respects, similar to a snake in others, and similar to a large battleship in the only way that mattered at that moment. It moved along with all the grace a serpent could muster, reared back, and then fired a beam of rolling solar fire out from its hex-jawed mouth. The beam arched over the forest to slam into the large energy shield surrounding the mountain and its outlying communities. The shield flared orange for a moment, and then disappeared in a flash of light.

Hundreds of jets of steam poured out of the gaps in the behemoth's armor, and Jörmungandr let this happen for a time before unhinging its jaws and preparing another blast. It got as far that, and then the night sky was lit up with an orange flare that burned away the darkness of the early morning. A split second later _Tyr_ slammed its right shoulder into Jörmungandr's head with jump jets firing full bore, causing the serpent's plasma beam to burn away five feet of mountain side before screaming off into the distance.

Inside the control pod Hancock's half-lidded eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Both she and Tyr were in agreement, no words needed to be spoken to confirm it. It was just a matter of enacting their planned actions. And so she fired.

Plasma beam after plasma beam. Missile after missile. Bullet after bullet. Shell after shell. All streaked towards Jörmungandr from _Tyr_'s retreating form. Some hit, others went streaking off into the early morning sky as the massive worm dodged, but they all did their job and drew the fiend's attention onto the far younger being to the South.

_Tyr_ ran. It ran, and it dodged, executing a series of maneuvers that had only been tried in simulations before due to the limited space available for training and a natural unwillingness to leave Earth undefended. Along the way it fired off stream after stream of 20mm railgun fire to keep the ANSET interested.

Inside the command pod Hancock briefly glanced at the MFD showing the ammo available for her railguns. 156, 156, 158, 158. She stopped firing, curled her index finger behind the trigger, and switched her thumb over the left-most button on the back of the right control stick. She depressed the button, and _Tyr_ fired its MAC, sending one giant tungsten dart and discarding iron sabot flying towards the ANSET.

The round hit, digging deep into the creature's armored flesh. However, it soon retaliated with a short energy blast of its own quickly thereafter. The blast hit, and hundreds of pounds of armor was melted off _Tyr_'s body.

As the bio-mech sped away, Hancock's vision swam. Her mind was already taxed to its absolute limit from the previous battles, the only feelings in her left arm were side-effects of phantom limb syndrome, her body was pumped full of pain-killers to counteract the effects of the sympathetic injuries she knew couldn't exist but her nerves told her must. There was only so much further she could go on.

Like a pillar of fire though, salvation came from on high in the form of a radio transmission.

"_Angel, are you still alive?"_ a young male voice came over the inter-lance comm channel.

"Monk?" Hancock questioned in a confused tone.

"_I'll take that as a yes. Angel, the ANSET jamming our comms bugged out when the _Odyssey_ showed up in orbit, which means that I can now tell you that SPARTANs are pussies,"_ Airman First Class Donald Lockheed Reeves said happily, using a pop-culture reference that he had explained to Hancock a few months back.

"I ag—RAAAGH!" Hancock howled in pain as the ANSET's beam weapon severed _Tyr_'s legs at the knees.

"_Airman!"_ Tyr called out over the comm.

"_It's all right,"_ Hancock said as she managed to prop her bio-mech up on its elbows. A split second later another beam plowed into _Tyr_'s chest, and the temperature inside the command pod jumped to over a hundred and fifty degrees. The pilot let out another howl of pain at this.

"_Hancock, I'm ejecting the command pod,"_ Tyr informed her with worry in his normally calm voice.

Leona's eyes shot open with the only genuine emotion she had felt all morning. "What? No! Tyr, I'm not going to just leave you here! Without me you won't be able project an ATF!"

"_Wrong, I shall be able to project an ATF for ten seconds after you leave, just long enough for Monk to arrive,"_ Tyr informed her as he severed the connections between the command pod and his body.

"_Disengaging!"_ Reeves called out, right on cue.

"Tyr, no. Please, don't do this!" Leona screamed, futility moving the right control stick back and forth as she did so.

"_Goodbye, Leona,"_ Tyr said mournfully as explosive blots separated the hatch covering the command pod's back from his body.

"Tyyyyyyyyyyyyr!" Leona wailed as the command pod rocketed out of _Tyr_'s back and flew through the pre-dawn sky, even as that same sky grew brighter.

Jörmungandr turned its head to view the new threat. It was big, it was bright, it illuminated all of Eastern Colorado like a newborn sun, and it was traveling at 23,000 miles an hour. The ANSET opened its mouth to prepare counterattack, but it was too late. 9.860645459 seconds after being dropped from the bottom of the _Daedalus_-class battlecrusier _U.S.S. Odyssey_ the GM-206A Wolverine bio-mech known as _Baldur_ plowed into Jörmungandr in a massive explosion of energy shields, AT Fields, inertial dampeners, air pressure, blood, and sheer kinetic energy.

–

After the command pod had settled onto the ground Hancock went about the business of preparing for the S&R teams. She quickly blew open the hatch to avoid residual heat melting it shut, causing MPAAF to flood out onto the ground; she removed her vacuum collar, and took off her helmet; and then, finally, she contacted her squad mates.

"Tyr, come in; are you there?" Hancock moaned as she checked on her face with her sole functioning hand.

"_I am here, Airman. Battered, but alive,"_ Tyr responded weakly.

"_Yeah, we're alive too, thanks for asking,"_ Reeves snarked in false indignation.

"_Indeed, and we have slain one of our new enemies in the process. Truly this is a great victory, is it not?"_ the brash and course voice of Baldur said heartily.

"_We're all alive,"_ the voice of Major Parsons informed them. _"Well, most of us anyway. Casualty reports are still coming in from the effected areas, but for right now? Good work everyone, especially you Hancock. You've definitely earned yourself a medal today."_

"Just doing my job, sir," Hancock replied on instinct as she was briefly overcome by the feeling of someone watching her.

"_Indeed,"_ Parsons replied with that sounded like a smile. _"Well, we've got S&R teams en route to pick you up, so sit tight."_

"Can do, sir," Hancock said as she settled in for the long haul, wincing as she upset her sympathetic injuries in the process. She waited, and the rescue crews came an hour later.

A new day dawned on Colorado Springs.

–

Author's End Notes: OK, so it's been seven and a half months since I last updated. . . . I'm sorry; I'll try to do better next time. In the mean time, I like to state that President Howard Ackerman is from _Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3,_ and as such belongs to EA. I'd also like to thank Sereina for the beta reading job, and for keeping after me about the "than"s. So, without further ado, let's see the preview of the next chapter.

–

In the days and weeks following the battle the fallout thickens. The Pentagon scrambles to fight a losing PR war, SG-1 combs the galaxy looking for clues to the night's events, Shinji wakes up in a new city and struggles to find his place, and Leona makes a drastic mistake that could jeopardize the careers of everyone in the BMP. It all happens in the next exciting chapter, "The Calm." Read it, and we'll be sure to slip a little something extra in as well. ;)


End file.
